LIBRARY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


The  0/rf 


Corner 


THE 

GHOST 

GIRL 


h 

Edgar  Saltus 


BONI    AND    LlVERIGHT 

Publishers  NEW  YORK 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


Copyright,  1922,  by 
BONI  AND  LTVERIGHT,  INC. 

PRINTED   IN   THE   UNITED   STATES   OF   AMERICA 


THE  GHOST  GIRL 


THE  GHOST  GiRL 


THE  vivid  climax  to  Nelly  Chilton's  wedding  star 
tled  a  metropolis  long  since  used  to  the  startling.  But 
the  spectacular  termination  of  the  beauty's  marriage 
was  commonplace  by  comparison  to  incidents  that  su 
pervened. 

In  Bil  Sayers'  novel,  "The  Halls  of  Eblis,"  many 
of  these  incidents  are  told.  The  telling  is  the  admirable 
work  of  an  admirable  writer.  Events  are  set  forth, 
not  as  they  did  occur,  but  as  they  should  have  occurred, 
which  is  the  only  way  to  tell  a  story.  In  the  present 
document  that  process  has  been  reversed. 

Among  those  who  stood  witness  to  the  events  were 
Jim  Bradish  and  your  servant.  He  and  I  had  been 
classmates  at  Harvard,  fellow  students  in  foreign  uni 
versities,  companions  in  the  proscenia  and  side-scenes 
of  life.  We  had  travelled,  feasted  and  starved  to 
gether.  I  may  say  I  knew  him,  that  is  if  one  human 
being  ever  does  know  another.  While  in  Japan  a  cable 
caught  us.  His  father  was  dead.  Bradish  was  a  very 
rich  man. 

At  the  time,  I  had,  or  thought  I  had,  enough  to  go 
around,  a  bundle  of  bonds  with  which  the  trustee  was 
diverting  himself.  When  Bradish  and  I  reached  New 
York  he  was  a  plutocrat  and  I  was  a  pauper.  I  hate 
the  alliteration.  More  hateful  still  was  the  fact. 

I  have  been  about  a  bit  and  I  know  of  no  place 


8  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

where  poverty  is  agreeable,  or  any  place  anywhere 
where  it  is  less  agreeable  than  in  New  York.  Along  the 
glittering  precinct  in  which  my  people  had  moved,  I 
was  like  the  man  who  fell  from  the  balloon,  simply 
out  of  it.  But  not  irremediably.  Bradish  did  the 
obvious  thing.  He  did  not  ask,  he  insisted  on  being 
my  banker. 

It  would,  I  dare  say,  seem  very  fine  of  me  if  I  had 
balked.  I  did  nothing  of  the  kind.  I  drew  on  him  for 
what  little  I  actually  required.  In  two  years  I  was 
afloat.  A  year  later  he  was  repaid.  I  was  what  is 
termed  a  best-seller.  Nothing  to  boast  of,  quite  the 
contrary. 

Meanwhile  the  glittering  precinct  was  closed  to 
Bradish  also,  though,  necessarily,  not  as  it  was  to  me. 
I  lacked  the  money  to  walk  in.  He  lacked  the  courage. 

In  looking  back  at  it  all  now,  I  realise  what  I  did 
not  recognise  then.  In  a  previous  life  he  must  have 
done  something  very  evil.  What  he  had  done  only 
the  keepers  of  the  doors  that  close  behind  our  birth 
could  tell.  But  whatever  it  may  have  been,  he  paid 
for  it.  I  have  seen  and,  what  is  worse  I  have  seen  him 
see,  people  shrink  back  open-mouthed  from  before 
him.  Karma  had  plastered  his  face  with  a  birthmark 
shaped  and  coloured  like  a  great  scarlet  spider.  In 
spite  of  which  he  had  the  gentleness  of  a  giant.  After 
the  lovable  fashion  of  a  sundial,  it  was  only  serene 
hours  of  which  he  took  count.  In  unphilosophic  New 
York  that  is  always  a  feat.  It  is  one,  though,  which 
presently  he  ceased  to  perform. 

Meanwhile,  I  had  pitched  my  tent  in  that  loveliness 
that  Harlem  is.  The  tent  was  on  the  top  floor  of  what 
is  agreeably  known  as  a  walkup.  Bradish  hated  it. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  9 

But  he  came  there.  I  told  him  not  to  come.  I  told 
him  I  did  not  want  him.  I  told  him  I  did  not  want 
anybody.  Idle  tears.  Up  the  interminable  stairs  he 
stalked  and  pounded  and  pounded,  threatening  to  break 
the  door  down.  When,  cursing  the  interruption,  I 
threw  it  open,  in  he  would  tumble,  followed,  as  often 
as  not,  by  Mike,  one  of  his  many  servants,  a  mechani 
cian  usually  bowed  to  the  ground  with  a  hamper  of 
aspic  and  game,  wine  and  strong  waters. 

In  those  days  I  was  so  out  of  it  that  I  knew  nothing 
except  what  I  invented.  But  in  Bradish's  great,  white, 
staring  house,  there  were  always  men  to  dinner,  to 
supper,  to  breakfast,  for  all  I  know  to  the  contrary, 
and  the  talk  of  these  men,  who  knew  what  was  going 
on,  and  a  lot  that  was  not,  he  retailed  to  me  and  it  was 
all  so  much  fresh  air.  Again  and  again  it  supplied  a 
situation,  the  slang  of  the  day,  the  prompt  retort. 

I  can  see  him  now,  sitting  back,  drinking  his  cigar, 
drinking,  too,  his  strong  waters  and,  in  the  orange  light 
of  my  low  lamp,  that  spider  barely  visible.  Usually 
a  dull  brick  it  was  only  in  moments  of  excitement  that 
it  reddened.  It  seemed  then  a  living  thing.  There 
have  been  times  when  I  could  have  sworn  I  saw  it 
extending  and  contracting  its  antennae.  There  have 
been  others  when  it  seemed  about  to  spring.  That, 
though,  was  later. 

One  night — it  was  in  the  third  year  after  our  return 
to  this  country — and  on  a  night  when  it  was  snowing 
like  the  very  devil,  I  heard  the  usual  uproar.  It  was 
the  only  way  that  he,  or  anyone  else  for  that  matter, 
could  get  at  me.  There  was  no  telephone.  I  had  had 
the  accursed  thing  removed.  Moreover  it  was  idle  to 
ring,  in  addition  to  being  hazardous.  Touch  the  but- 


io  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

ton  and  you  get  a  shock.  I  had  had  a  battery  put  in 
for  that  purpose.  To  lead  a  profitable  life  of  crime 
requires  silence,  solitude  and  a  natural  gift  for  villainy. 
By  this  time,  that  gift  and  those  fortifications  aiding, 
I  was  afloat,  all  sales  flying,  if  I  may  be  permitted  a 
stupid  jest,  one  which,  together  with  everything  else 
concerning  myself,  I  throw  in  to  be  rid  of.  This  is 
not  a  biography,  heaven  forbid.  It  is  the  account  of 
a  door,  closed  and  barred,  and  not  mine  either. 

On  this  night,  for  the  first  time,  I  approached  it. 
It  was  wide  open,  so  wide  that  all  I  saw  were  the  vistas 
beyond.  It  was  not  until  later  that  I  realised  that  there 
was  a  door  there,  a  door  that  was  to  shut  itself,  shut 
tighter  than  a  wall. 

The  night  was  vile.  There  was  a  wind  to  blow 
your  head  off  and  I  thanked  fortune  that  I  had  had  the 
forethought,  which  I  often  lacked,  to  larder  up  before 
hand,  when  I  heard  Bradish  hammering  and  reviling 
me  outside. 

Superbly  befurred,  in  a  coat  whith  even  a  tenor 
might  have  denied  himself,  but,  the  coat  apart,  dressed 
as  he  usually  was,  with  that  appearance  of  the  thread 
bare  which,  in  a  man  of  large  means,  is  always  superi 
orly  correct,  he  stamped  in,  kicking  and  throwing  the 
snow  off  on  me  and,  once  in  my  workshop,  removing  the 
coat  which  he  dropped  on  the  floor. 

Then,  puffing  a  bit,  he  greeted  me. 

"You  live  like  a  bandit." 

On  one  of  my  few  chairs  I  sat  down  and  looked  at 
him. 

"What  do  you  want?" 

"More  than  I  can  get.  More  than  I  deserve  if  I 
could  get  it." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  n 

"Here,"  I  said,  "don't  run  into  excesses.  The  liquor 
is  behind  you." 

He  waved  at  me.  "You  remember  the  ships  crowded 
in  Aulis  like  white  birds?" 

I  took  it  in  and  handed  it  back.  "But  not  the  face 
that  crowded  them  there.  I  never  saw  the  lady  and 
I  doubt  that  anyone  else  did.  It  all  happened  a  long 
time  ago  and  probably  never  happened  at  all.  Any 
way,  beauty  since  then  has  departed.  Successively 
women  became  handsome,  good-looking,  pretty.  Now 
they  think  it  smart  to  be  plain." 

It  was  a  long  speech  and  I  lit  a  cigarette. 

He  fidgeted  about  and  lit  one  also.  "You  would  not 
have  said  that  this  afternoon."  Informatively  he  con 
tinued:  "Aphrodite  never  existed " 

"Good  Lord !  I  thought  it  was  Helen  you  were  talk 
ing  of." 

"But  she  exists  today." 

"Well,  I  am  sure  Swinburne  would  be  glad  to  know 
it.  What  is  her  present  style  and  title?" 

Negligently  he  strewed  the  ashes.     "Miss  Chilton." 

"Oh!"  I  said  longly,  for  even  in  my  Harlem  fast 
ness  the  rumour  of  her  beauty  had  reached  me.  "How 
did  you  swim  into  her  galley?" 

"Brevoort  brought  her  to  see  some  etchings." 

"What  did  she  say?" 

"Nothing." 

"Very  well-bred  of  her.  See  here!  The  original 
Chilton  was  a  patroon,  was  he  not?  Or  no,  he  could 
not  have  been.  A  lord  of  the  manor,  that's  it.  There 
is  a  Chilton  Manor  somewhere  up  the  Hudson.  Didn't 
she  say  anything?" 


12  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"It  was  her  mother  who  did  the  talking.  I  asked 
them  to  dinner  tomorrow.  You  have  got  to  come." 

Well,  why  not?  I  thought,  for  the  turpitude  on 
which  I  had  been  engaged  was  done  and  I  said:  "Send 
a  car  for  me." 

To  my  knowledge  he  had  six  cars,  which  is  only  rea 
sonable,  and  he  may  have  had  more,  which  is  not. 
None  the  less  he  rebuked  me. 

"You  act  like  a  prima  donna." 

But  he  sent  the  car  and  I  went. 

The  drawing-room,  huge,  high-ceiled,  frescoed,  fit 
ted  in  yellow  and  black,  was  unusually  bare,  to  the  foot 
that  is,  and  I  wondered  at  it.  At  one  end,  fronting 
windows  that  gave  on  upper  Fifth  Avenue,  were  two 
rows  of  chairs.  At  them  also  I  wondered. 

"A  camp-meeting?"  I  said  to  Mrs.  Trefusis,  born 
a  Bradish,  who  was  there  with  her  daughter.  The  lat 
ter,  a  prim  debutante  who  could  throw  a  cartwheel 
without  displaying  much  of  her  subsurface  garments. 

Additionally  were  Brevoort,  a  gay  sort  of  ass;  his 
sister,  Hilaria  Vaux,  who  was  gayer ;  other  topnotchers, 
and  Cally,  a  physician,  whom  we  called  Cagliostro — a 
pleasantry  which  secretely  he  liked  and  openly  resented. 
The  best  of  us  have  our  weaknesses.  But  as  yet  not  the 
Chiltons. 

Finally  they  came. 

Bradish  introduced  me.     "This  is  Chandos  Poole." 

Mrs.  Chilton  gave  me  her  hand.  A  tall  woman, 
admirably  sent  out,  she  had  an  easy  way,  which  I  fan 
cied  could  be  very  repellent,  and  eyes  flat  as  a  snake's. 
Those  eyes  darted. 

"I  knew  your  mother."    She  turned  to  her  daughter. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  13 

"Darling,  you  have  heard  me  speak  of  dear  Mrs. 
Poole?" 

Probably  the  girl  never  had,  though  what  she  re 
plied  and  whether  she  replied,  I  have  forgotten.  I  was 
thinking  of  the  ships  crowded  at  Aulis,  one  of  which 
instantly  floated  me  to  Paphos  where  I  stood  before 
Aphrodite  when  young  and  a  girl. 

Nelly  Chilton  had  the  low  Greek  brow,  the  ineffable 
Greek  nose,  lips  lifted  at  the  corners  by  the  upturned 
comma  of  the  Athenian  mouth,  buttercup  hair,  an 
apple-blossom  skin  and  cornflower  eyes.  She  seemed 
to  have  gems  about  her,  not  that  she  needed  them  or 
had  them,  but  their  glow  was  there  and,  with  it,  a 
charm  that  was  overwhelming.  Many  a  man  would 
have  paid  through  the  nose  to  be  allowed  just  to  stand 
and  look  at  her. 

Aristotle,  asked  what  beauty  is,  dodged  it  and  said, 
"A  question  for  the  blind."  I  am  not  blind  and  I 
knew  that  I  stood  before  it.  It  is  a  rare  sensation. 
Only  once  had  I  experienced  it  quite  so  amply  and  that 
was  when  considering — through  fieldglasses — a  land 
scape  of  lilies  and  tigers. 

But  at  once  we  went  on  and  in  to  what  I  thought  a 
very  ordinary  dinner,  a  sort  of  pot-au-feu  with  wings 
to  it.  The  wings  were  ortolans,  though  where  and  how 
the  caitiff  of  a  chef  had  obtained  them,  I  afterward 
forgot  to  ask. 

The  room,  a  sort  of  baronial  hall,  extended  up 
through  two  storeys.  Midway,  it  was  circled  by  a  gal 
lery  from  which  other  rooms  abutted  and  from  which 
arrased  tapestries  hung. 

I  never  cared  for  it,  but  I  preferred  it  to  the  dinner 
which,  in  addition  to  being  ordinary,  was  dull.  If  it  had 


i4  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

not  been  for  Cally,  it  would  have  been  deadly.  Occa 
sionally,  Brevoort  flared  a  little  and  then  like  a  damp 
pinwheel  went  out.  On  one  side  I  had  the  Trefusis 
girl. 

Primly  she  remarked:  "Must  be  jolly  to  write  and 
do  what  you  like  to  the  heroines.  Don't  you  find  it 
nice  and  easy?" 

I  threw  one  of  my  own  cartwheels.  "Well,  hardly. 
This  morning  I  wrote  a  line.  This  afternoon  I 
scratched  it  out.  I  am  quite  exhausted." 

Up  a  bit,  on  the  opposite  side,  was  Miss  Chilton. 
I  saw  her  laughing  at  something  Cally  had  said.  Any 
emotion  is  unbecoming.  True  beauty  is  austere.  Yet 
her  laughter  heightened  hers.  It  did  not  deform,  it 
humanised.  It  lifted  her  from  mythology  and  set  her 
down  before  you  an  unspoiled,  unaffected  girl. 

From  her  I  looked  at  her  mother  who  was  talking 
to  Bradish,  no,  at  him.  After  the  manner  of  a  woman 
of  her  monde  and  her  years,  she  was  considerably  made 
up.  Behind  the  paint  and  the  slight  contractions  at  her 
eyes  and  mouth,  I  could  see  her  also,  a  soul  disillu 
sioned,  hungry,  fatigued,  indomitable — a  soul  common 
enough,  the  soul  of  a  woman  at  odds  with  fate  and 
determined  to  outwit  it. 

Voicelessly  I  said  to  my  neighbour,  "Is  Mrs.  Chilton 
a  widow?" 

"He  took  his  hat  and  umbrella  and  no  one  has  seen 
him  since." 

Sensible  man,  I  reflected. 

At  the  moment,  from  across  the  table,  Brevoort 
called  at  Miss  Chilton. 

"If  you  were  not  yourself,  who  would  you  dislike 
to  be?" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  15 

"But  that  is  just  it,"  she  answered.  "We  aren't 
any  of  us  ourselves.  We  are  all  of  us  masked  and  it  is 
that  I  dislike.  I  don't  want  a  disguise,  I  want  to  be 
Me." 

She  spoke  with  little  pauses  in  a  husky  Mayfair 
voice  that  was  singularly  fetching.  At  the  time  that 
was  all  I  noticed,  except  that  Bradish,  who  had  been 
literally  hanging  on  her  words,  looked  as  though  he 
could  jump  straight  down  the  throat  from  which  they 
came. 

That  is  all  I  noticed.  But  there  is  a  Russian  saying 
to  the  effect  that  life  is  a  dark  room  in  which  we  are 
shut  in  with  an  enemy — the  eternal  enemy  that  we  have 
within  us — and  from  whom  we  have  to  fight  free. 
Afterward  I  recalled  that  saying  and  wondered  whether 
she  knew  it  and  had  been  translating  it  for  us.  Yet 
how  dark  that  dark  room  of  hers  was  to  become  she 
could  not  have  known.  None  of  us  knew.  But  even 
then  its  shadows  were  groping  for  her.  At  the  glit 
tering  table,  in  the  great  lighted  hall,  more  particularly 
perhaps  in  the  brilliance  of  her  incredible  beauty,  no 
one  could  see  them.  Yet,  stealthy,  ominous,  relentless, 
they  were  reaching  for  her,  reaching,  too,  for  Bradish, 
stretching  out  to  cover  them  both,  to  shroud  them,  to 
hide  them  away. 

Then,  at  once,  everybody  was  getting  up. 

Now,  though,  in  the  drawing-room,  the  chairs  that 
fronted  the  windows  were  occupied  by  people,  very 
sumptuous  all  of  them,  and  all  convulsed  by  some  pri 
vate  joke. 

For  all  I  knew  they  might  have  been  the  pick  of  the 
social  basket.  Yet,  suddenly,  pushing  back  the  chairs, 
there  they  were  clapping  and  singing,  kicking  up  before 


16  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

and  behind,  while  one  of  them,  a  ravishing  little  animal, 
tiptoed  out  on  the  bare  floor  and  danced. 

The  singing  sank.  At  the  piano  was  a  fat  lady. 
Still  the  girl  danced,  not  acrobatically  as  I  believe  the 
fashion  was  then,  but  with  what  I  imagined  might  be 
the  fabled  art  of  Taglioni.  Presently,  with  a  back 
ward  gesture  at  her  spangled  skirt,  she  stopped  and 
bowed.  On  her  forehead,  one  drop  of  perspiration 
glistened. 

I  did  not  see  her  again  for  a  little  and  meanwhile 
a  man,  with  a  lot  of  hair  and  an  affable  manner,  asked 
me  for  my  hat,  hoped  I  had  not  been  careless  enough 
to  lose  it,  borrowed  Brevoort's  handkerchief,  a  square 
of  folded  linen,  from  which  he  shook  out  a  shower  of 
orchids  that  drenched  Miss  Chilton. 

Then,  at  once,  the  other  sumptuous  people  treated 
us  to  a  farce,  of  which  the  fun  was  so  good  and  so  quick 
that  some  of  us  roared  and  Miss  Chilton  laughed. 

I  could  see  her  at  it  and  I  thought  she  should  never 
do  anything  else,  except  smile.  For  a  while  there 
after  smile  she  did,  no  doubt,  and  often  I  dare  say, 
if  only  for  the  mere  civility  of  it,  but  when  that  little 
while  had  passed  I  never  saw  her  smile  again. 

Presently  there  was  a  frisk  and  afterward  there  was 
supper.  During  the  frisk,  I  delighted  myself,  and  I 
hope  the  fat  lady,  by  two-stepping  with  her.  Bradish 
orang-outangoed  with  the  little  ballerina.  But,  good 
chap  that  he  was,  he  put  me  beside  her  at  supper,  a 
real  old-fashioned  orgy,  at  which  we  all  drank  too 
much,  except  the  Chiltons  and  the  Trefusis,  who  long 
since  had  gone,  the  prim  debutante  showing  off  to  the 
delighted  Rialtians  a  tiptop  cartwheel  as  she  went. 

How  young  we  were  then!  How  young  and  how 
mad! 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  17 

II 

BEFORE  me,  the  next  evening,  were  the  galleys  of 
my  latest  crime.  However  iniquitous  the  copy,  the 
proofs  were  worse.  They  were  larded  with  microscopic 
felonies  which  required  the  eyes  of  a  bug  and  the  pa 
tience  of  a  philosopher  to  detect,  yes,  and  with  the  cer 
tainty  of  defeat  in  the  end — yet  I  was  attempting  to 
correct  them. 

All  at  once  the  ink  shook  all  over  it.  An  earthquake 
had  jarred  my  elbow.  There  was  Bradish  again. 

When  I  opened,  there  was  Cally  also. 

With  my  usual  courtesy  I  greeted  them.  "Entrez, 
canailles/9 

In  mitigation,  Bradish  gestured.  "He  picked  me 
up  in  the  street." 

"Misfortunes  never  come  singly,"  I  resignedly  re 
plied.  "They  come  single  file  and  ask  for  a  drink." 

"For  two  of  'em,"  said  Cally.  "I  have  been  dining 
at  Duncan's.  After  dinner  he  danced  a  pas  seul." 

"For  you?" 

We  were  then  in  the  workshop  where  I  got  out  spir 
its  which  I  knew  water  would  dampen. 

Cally  helped  himself  abundantly. 

"Some  time  since,  Duncan  called  me  in.  He  could 
not  walk.  He  could  shuffle  a  bit  and  even  that  hurt. 
Why,  he  did  not  know.  No  one  knew.  He  had  had  the 
indicated  tests  which  indicated  nothing.  He  told  me 
all  about  it,  told  it  endlessly.  I  said:  'Do  as  I  tell 
you  and  in  six  months  you  will  dance.'  Tonight,  the 
six  months  were  up.  He  danced.  He  danced  on  the 
dinner-table  and  broke  it  down.  Pass  the  bottle." 

"What  did  you  prescribe,  Cagliostro?" 


1 8  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"The  dentist.  I  told  him  to  have  his  teeth  out, 
every  one  of  them." 

"And  then  robbed  him!"  I  enviously  exclaimed. 
"Lord!  If  instead  of  a  hackman  I  were  only  a  physi 
cian!  It  is  true  I  have  bankrupted  a  lot  of  people  and 
I  hope  to  bankrupt  more.  But  I  do  it  in  cold  ink.  You 
do  it  in  cold  blood." 

Cally  nodded.  "You  are  having  a  good  time,  aren't 
you?"  Philosophically  he  added,  "Well,  we  all  had 
one  last  night." 

He  turned  to  Bradish.  "In  spite  of  the  charm  of 
one  of  your  guests,  I  have  held,  and  still  hold,  that 
beauty  is  a  survival." 

Blandly  he  turned  to  me.  "Where  is  your  tele 
phone?" 

"Down  stairs,  around  the  corner,  two  streets  up, 
across  the  way,  at  the  undertaker's." 

Bradish  lit  another  cigarette.  "Did  you  ever  hear 
of  such  a  chap?" 

"Genius  is  always  eccentric,"  Cally  quite  as  blandly 
replied. 

He  was  bland.  With  a  pointed  beard,  eyebrows  that 
were  a  bit  upturned  and  a  beak  of  a  nose,  he  had  all  the 
blandness  of  Mephistopheles. 

At  that  beard  he  plucked.  Then  putting  on  his  hat, 
out  he  went. 

The  door  had  not  closed  before  Bradish  was  at  me. 

"The  Chiltons  are  coming  to  supper.  They  are  at 
the  opera  now  with  Mrs.  Amsterdam.  I  told  them  to 
fetch  her  and  that  I  would  fetch  you.  You  will  like 
Mrs.  Amsterdam.  Or  rather  she  will  like  you.  She  is 
very  keen  on  good-looking  young  bloods." 

"Go  to  the  devil  I"  I  retorted.     "Good  Lord!  Mrs. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  19 

Amsterdam!  I  remember  her  when  I  was  a  little 
shaver.  Why,  I  have  sat  in  her  lap." 

"Have  you?  Well,  don't  remind  her  of  that  if  she 
sits  in  yours.  Now  run  along  and  dress." 

I  put  the  proofsheets  before  him.  "While  I  am 
at  it,  here  is  some  rot  for  you." 

Bradish  laughed.  "You're  the  most  hospitable  chap 
I  ever  knew." 

When  I  returned,  he  was  looking  at  something  else, 
at  a  mental  vision  of  Nelly  Chilton,  I  think,  for  as  I 
entered  he  gave  a  sort  of  start. 

It  is  years  since  then,  but  often  I  have  thought  how 
differently  it  might  have  fared  with  him  and  how  dif 
ferently  it  would  have  fared  with  her,  could  his 
vision  have  been  clairvoyant.  Yet,  in  that,  I  am 
probably  in  error.  Probably,  whatever  the  future  holds 
for  us  is  pre-written  in  our  progression.  None  the  less, 
I  cannot  but  feel  that  all  would  have  been  changed, 
his  life  and  her  life,  if  for  but  a  moment's  space  he 
could  have  beheld  the  halls  that  were  waiting  for  him 
then.  Hung  with  enigmas,  tapestried  with  tears,  Bil 
Sayers  called  them  the  Halls  of  Eblis,  which,  I  believe, 
is  Arabic  for  hell.  If  he  could  have  seen  them,  and 
the  "if"  is  enormous,  he  might  have  outwitted  fate. 

"Comeonski,"  I  said,  an  invitation  which  we  had 
acquired  in  Moscow. 

He  got  at  his  watch.  Thin  as  a  wafer,  it  was  always 
wrong. 

"Yes,  let's  hurry.     I  hope  Cally  has  not  taken  the 


car." 


There  were  cabs  in  Harlem  then,  except  when  you 
wanted  one  and  below,  in  the  street,  the  spectacle  of 
Mike  hugging  himself  to  keep  warm,  was  comforting. 


20  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Home,"  Bradish  told  him,  "and  never  mind  the 
speed  law." 

Whether  or  not  Mike  minded  the  law  is  perhaps 
unimportant,  but  just  as  we  were  approaching  that 
home  a  fire-engine  burst  on  the  avenue  like  a  typhoon. 
Incidentally  a  taxi  was  dodging  it  and  against  that  taxi 
another  car  banged. 

Already  Mike  had  hopped  off.  Adjacently  great 
doors  had  opened.  Two  servants,  one  with  the  face  of 
a  wooden  mask  and  the  other  with  the  tread  of  a  cat, 
hurried  down.  From  the  first  taxi  two  women  alighted ; 
from  the  second  a  man.  The  typhoon  had  flown  afar, 
chased  by  another. 

.  But  now  we  were  all  on  the  sidewalk,  Bradish  and  I, 
Mike,  the  servants,  the  women,  the  man  and  two 
highly  abusive  mechanicians.  How  they  pacified  them 
selves  is  not  a  part  of  this  document.  The  women, 
furred  to  the  eyes,  were  unrecognisable;  to  me,  that 
is,  but  not  to  Bradish,  nor  yet  to  the  other  man  whose 
face  appeared  to  be  cut. 

Bradish,  meanwhile,  was  doing  the  honours  of  the 
pavement  to  the  women,  whom  also  the  injured  man 
addressed,  and  I  saw  one  of  them  give  him  her  hand, 
while  the  other  affected  to  be  unaware  that  he  was 
about. 

Bradish  called  at  the  wooden  mask.  "Peters,  show 
the  ladies  in."  He  called  at  the  catman.  "Gedney, 
see  to  their  wraps."  He  turned  to  the  wounded.  "You 
must  not  bleed  to  death.  Come  in  with  me  and  we  will 
apply  first  aid.  My  name  is  Bradish.  I  see  you  know 
my  guests." 

"They  are  relatives  of  mine,"  lightly  the  wounded 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  21 

man  answered.  uMy  name  is  Austen.  But  I  have 
only  a  scratch.  Just  as  many  thanks  to  you  though." 

As  he  spoke,  he  held  his  hat  on  with  one  hand  and 
with  the  other  patted  his  face. 

Without  lingering  to  hear  more,  I  went  on  and  up 
the  steps,  beyond  which  events  were  lurking,  as  they 
do  lurk,  until  they  are  ready  for  us,  though  without 
waiting  until  we  are  ready  for  them,  which  only  the 
sage  ever  is.  Yet,  as  I  look  back  now,  I  can  see  that 
even  then  they  were  gathering,  prepared  to  pounce. 

In  the  yellow  and  black  room  I  found  the  Chiltons, 
found  too  that  I  was  in  no  immediate  danger.  Mrs. 
Amsterdam  was  not  there. 

"Is  he  coming  in?"  Miss  Chilton  asked. 

Without  knowing  to  whom  she  referred,  I  told  her 
of  course  he  was. 

"It  is  strange,"  the  beauty  continued.  "I  am  fated 
to  be  in  an  accident.  It  is  in  my  horoscope.  But  it 
is  very  wrong  to  believe  in  that.  The  Church  forbids 
it.  It  is  among  the  secret  things  and  secret  things, 
the  Bible  teaches,  belong  only  to  the  Lord." 

In  speaking,  she  crossed  herself. 

I  was  profoundly  astonished  but  I  hope  I  did  not 
show  it. 

"None  the  less,"  she  continued,  "when  I  saw  that 
great  mad  thing  rushing  at  us,  I " 

"The  typhoon  you  mean?"  I  put  in. 

"Typhoon!  What  typhoon?"  Mrs  Chilton  surpris- 
edly  called  at  me. 

But  Bradish  was  effecting  his  entrance,  and  she 
turned  to  him. 

"Sorry  about  Laura  Amsterdam.     She  threw  us 


over." 


22  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"The  point  is,"  Bradish  with  some  gallantry  replied, 
"that  you  are  here  and  shortly  your  relative  will  be." 

"Relative!"  Mrs.  Chilton,  in  the  same  surprised 
manner,  exclaimed.  "What  relative?" 

Bradish  motioned.  "A  Mr.  Austen  who  is  slowly 
recovering  from  a  wound  that  might  have  been  mortal." 

Mrs.  Chilton  motioned  also.  The  gesture,  though 
slight,  contrived  to  be  emphatic.  It  reduced  any  re 
lationship  to  nothingness. 

"Nonsense!  Some  of  our  people  were  related  ages 
ago.  If  it  comes  to  that,  everybody  is  related  to  every 
body." 

Now  though,  in  the  wide  doorway,  he  too  appeared. 
The  spaciousness  framed  him,  disclosing  the  portrait  of 
a  man  young,  tall,  virile,  abominably  good-looking, 
with  an  air  curiously  and  attractively  insolent.  From 
his  face  the  blood  had  gone.  A  strip  of  court-plaster 
replaced  it. 

"Aunt  Mary,"  he  leisurely  remarked  at  Mrs.  Chil 
ton.  "If  that  brute  of  a  taximan  of  mine  jarred  you 
ever  so  little,  you  know  I  regret  it." 

What  a  crammer,  I  thought.  For  it  was  not  regret 
that  his  face  expressed,  it  was  impudence.  It  was  as 
though  he  were  telling  her:  "See  here  now,  I  am,  and 
shall  be,  one  too  many  for  you." 

But  as  I  am  not  writing  fiction  I  may  admit  that 
that  interpretation  came  to  me  not  then  but  later  when 
I  thought  it  over.  Yet  though  I  still  think  the  inter 
pretation  correct,  I  know  he  was  wrong.  He  was  not 
one  too  many  for  her.  She  was  one  too  many  for  him. 
Yes,  and  fate  was  too  many  for  both. 

Meanwhile  we  had  all  gone  in  to  supper.  Bradish 
had  Mrs.  Chilton  at  his  right,  and,  at  his  left,  the 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  23 

beauty,  next  to  whom  Austen  succeeded  in  seating  him 
self. 

I  sat  next  to  Mrs.  Chilton  who  thoughtfully  and 
generally  remarked: 

"It  is  too  bad  about  Laura  Amsterdam.  She  would 
have  made  the  table  even." 

But  she  meant  that  it  was  too  bad  about  Austen. 
Without  him  the  table  would  have  been  evener. 

I  took  that  in  with  some  pheasant  that  had  been 
cooked,  with  oranges  and  almonds,  in  madeira  and  tea, 
and  though  that  of  course  is  the  only  way  that  a  pheas 
ant  could  be  cooked,  yet  I  felt  that  the  caitiff  below 
stairs  was  improving. 

While  I  was  savouring  it,  I  glanced  over  at  the 
beauty  who  was  talking  to  Austen.  At  the  moment  she 
again  suggested  Aphrodite  and  I  marvelled  at  this 
paradox  in  flesh  and  blood  who  looked  like  a  pagan 
goddess  and  talked  like  a  mediaeval  saint.  Yet  though 
the  mythological  quality  persisted,  it  seemed  subli 
mated  then  by  something  else,  by  just  what  I  could 
not  immediately  determine,  but  in  a  moment  I  did.  In 
her  eyes  there  was  a  glow,  in  her  voice  a  caress  and  it 
seemed  to  me  that  the  beauty  was  in  love,  profoundly 
in  love  I  imagined,  and  I  wondered  with  whom. 

When,  finally,  I  nailed  the  lucky  devil,  it  was  without 
any  applause  for  my  own  acumen. 

uYou  do  nothing  but  eat/'  Bradish  threw  at  me. 

"Yes,"  I  threw  back.  "But  I  think  when  I  eat  and 
just  now  I  was  thinking  of  an  ideal  repast  which  we 
once  enjoyed  and  which  was  composed  of  chrysanthe 
mum  soup  and  the  maxims  of  Confucius." 

"And  dolphin,  too,"  Bradish  put  in.  "Don't  forget 
the  dolphin!" 


24  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"I  never  heard  of  such  a  thing."  Mrs.  Chilton  re 
suming  her  surprised  manner,  exclaimed.  "A  dol 
phin!  How  was  it  cooked?" 

"With  various  sauces  and  condiments,"  I  told  her. 
"You  know  the  adage — Sweet  are  the  juices  of  diver 
sity?" 

"No,"  she  determinedly  replied.  "I  do  not  know  the 
adage  and  now  that  I  have  heard  it,  I  dislike  it  ex 
tremely." 

"Yes,"  said  Bradish.    "It  is  very  painful." 

But  I  did  not  propose  to  be  snubbed  and  I  took  it  up 
again. 

"Everything  that  has  to  do  with  eating  is  painful. 
Eating  takes  away  your  appetite.  I  have  always  loved 
the  bishop  who  said :  'God  bless  our  home  and  damn  our 
cook/  " 

"But  not  Mr.  Bradish's  cook,"  Mrs.  Chilton,  with 
the  same  determination,  retorted.  "Last  night  the 
dinner  was  perfect  and  tonight  the  supper  is  plus  que 
parfait  Darling!" 

She  looked  at  her  daughter  and  turned  to  Bradish. 
"We  must  be  going." 

She  added  something  which  I  did  not  hear.  Then 
she  repeated  it.  "Darling!" 

Presently,  when  they  were  again  furred  to  the  eyes, 
and  we  were  putting  them  in  Bradish's  car,  I  could 
not  see  Mrs.  Chilton's  face,  though  I  would  have 
given  a  dollar  for  the  privilege.  Unrebuffably  Austen 
got  in  with  them. 

It  was  some  time  before  I  saw  him  again  or  the  Chil- 
tons  either.  When  I  did  see  them,  a  door  was  closing 
and  beyond  was  a  sphinx. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  25 

III 

IT  must  have  been  after  two  when,  again  in  Harlem, 
I  went  up  the  interminable  stairs.  On  the  way  I  was 
thinking  of  that  girl  and  her  undreamed-of  beauty. 
As  I  began  at  the  fifth,  I  saw  what  I  took  to  be  an  old 
woman  huddled  on  the  landing  opposite  my  door.  But, 
as  I  advanced,  she  stood  up.  I  saw  then  she  was  not 
old  but  young  and,  immediately,  as  I  approached  her, 
I  could  not  help  it,  I  started  and  nearly  slipped.  Then 
I  raised  my  hat.  It  was  Nelly  Chilton ! 

Why  was  she  there?  How  had  she  come?  What 
did  she  want?  And  where  had  she  got  a  hat  and  where 
had  she  changed  her  furs?  Where,  for  that  matter, 
had  she  changed  her  expression?  At  supper  it  had 
been  alluring.  Now  it  was  reserved. 

My  bewilderment  must  have  been  very  manifest. 
In  any  event,  at  once  she  spoke.  With  an  intonation, 
slightly  foreign,  she  said  something. 

I  heard,  but  I  did  not  hear  understandingly.  That 
also  she  must  have  seen.  She  spoke  again. 

uCouldyou,  without  inconvenience,  loan  me  a  chair?" 

I  did  get  that  and  inanely  I  parroted  it. 

"A  chair?" 

She  indicated  an  adjoining  door.  "I  have  lost  my 
key.  Until  morning  I  am  a  vagrant." 

And  an  exotic,  I  thought,  for  already  I  had  recog 
nised  my  mistake. 

"You  are  quite  right." 

That  is  what  she  said  and  I  started  again. 

"About  what?"  But,  rallying,  I  resumed;  "I  have 
five  chairs,  I  have  even  six,  but  the  sixth  is  broken. 
You  shall  have  whatever  displeases  you  least." 


26  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

I  opened  my  door,  switched  the  light  in  the  hall  and 
turned  to  her. 

She  entered  and  followed  me  into  the  workshop 
where  I  again  switched  a  light. 

As  I  looked  at  her  then,  she  sniffed,  much  as  a  ter 
rier  will,  and  catalogued  me. 

"You  are  a  literary  man." 

"No,  I  write  for  the  magazines.  There  is  nothing 
less  literary  than  that.  Will  you  try  this  chair?" 

As  I  spoke,  I  looked  again.  In  feature,  in  colouring, 
her  resemblance  to  Nelly  Chilton  was  curious.  There 
it  stopped.  Similarly  dressed  and  seen  across  a  room, 
one  could  not  have  told  them  apart.  A  nearer  view 
differentiated.  Nelly  Chilton  looked  like  a  goddess  and 
talked  like  a  saint.  This  young  woman  looked  like  a 
princess  and,  as  I  presently  discovered,  talked  like  a 
sibyl.  The  other  girl's  beauty  was  pagan.  This  girl's 
was  noble.  Otherwise,  except  in  height  and  figure,  not 
a  pin  to  choose  between  them. 

"We  are  not  the  same,  are  we?  In  the  hall  I  saw 
you  mistook  me  for  her." 

In  private  life,  it  was  a  bit  weird. 

Immediately  she  added:  "Miss  Chilton  and  I  move 
in  different  spheres,  but  recently  I  came  in  contact  with 
her.  We  both  noticed  the  resemblance.  It  seemed 
to  amuse  her." 

"Well,  I'll  be  shot!"  I  exclaimed.  "Certainly  you 
are  very  gifted." 

"Unfortunately  gifted,"  she  corrected.  "Telepathy 
has  its  disadvantages." 

"And  its  compensations." 

"Occasionally,  as  in  the  present  instance.     I  know 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  27 

I  can  say  that,  for  I  know  also  you  will  not  misconstrue 
it." 

In  speaking,  she  removed  a  glove.  There  are  hands 
that  are  spiritual,  hands  that  are  coarse.  There  are 
philistine  hands  and  hands  that  are  artistic.  I  saw 
her  fingers,  long,  tapering,  and  I  chanced  it. 

"You  are  an  artist." 

"My  hand  is  tell-tale,  is  it  not?  Yet  the  tales  it  tells 
are  not  quite  true.  For  the  moment,  I  am  associated 
with  a  firm  of  interior  decorators.  It  was  there  I  saw 
Miss  Chilton.  But  I  am  intruding.  Perhaps  you  will 
help  me  with  a  chair." 

As  she  moved  toward  one,  I  saw  that  she  was  simply 
and  admirably  dressed,  dressed  with  an  originality  that 
is  nowhere  on  sale. 

"The  landing  is  a  bit  bleak,"  I  told  her.  "Why 
not  make  a  morning  of  it?" 

Momentarily  she  seemed  to  consider  it.  Then,  like 
a  good  fellow,  she  removed  her  wrap  and  sat  down. 

I  gave  her  my  name  and  she  gave  me  hers.  It  was 
Bolton,  Aly  Bolton. 

At  the  combination  I  exclaimed  and  she  said  her 
father  was  English  and  her  mother  Russian.  Both 
were  dead.  In  outline  she  sketched  her  life.  It  was  a 
very  cobwebby  outline.  In  exchange  I  gave  her  odds 
and  ends  from  my  own  career.  After  which  we  got 
back  at  the  beginning.  She  spoke  again  of  Miss  Chil 
ton  and  I  asked  what  she  thought  of  her. 

"Only  the  obvious  things.  She  is  a  little  obvious, 
is  she  not?  But " 

She  had  hesitated  and  it  trailed  away. 

I  prodded  her.     "But  what?" 

Then  it  appeared  she  could  "see,"  as  that  psychic 


28  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

term  is  used,  and  had  "seen"  since  she  was  a  child, 
when  it  perplexed  and  annoyed  her  parents.  She  had 
a  brother  who  died.  Afterward  she  played  with  him. 
Once,  when  he  was  in  a  chair  her  father  sat  on  him. 
She  screamed  and  hit  her  father  and  he  punished  her 
for  it.  After  that,  the  talent  was  hid  in  a  bushel. 
Since  then  it  had  diminished.  But  she  could  still  "see," 
at  least  a  little. 

So  she  explained  and  I  asked  what  she  saw  in  Miss 
Chilton. 

"In  her?  It  would  be  hard  to  say.  But,  about  her, 
I  saw  darkness,  thick  darkness  and  a  light  beyond." 

"How  did  you  see  that?  I  mean  how  does  anything 
of  the  kind  come  to  you?" 

"Very  much  as  though  I  were  looking  through  the 
wrong  end  of  the  opera-glass." 

"And  how  do  you  interpret  darkness?" 

"It's  a  symbol.    It  means  illness,  misfortune,  death." 

I  sat  back.  "Yes  and,  with  the  light  beyond,  the 
symbol  is  clear.  'Life  is  death  in  a  land  of  darkness. 
Death  is  life  in  a  land  of  light.'  " 

"Very  beautiful,"  she  said,  "and  probably  true. 
Whose  is  it?" 

"It  is  from  the  song  of  the  singer  going  out  from 
Amenti." 

"Amenti?" 

"The  Egyptian  purgatory.  There  the  disembodied 
were  judged.  If  they  had  harmed  no  heart,  if  they 
had  made  no  one  weep,  if  they  had  not  talked  abun 
dantly,  if  they  had  not  been  anxious,  harpers  took  up 
the  song,  they  were  free.  From  the  land  of  darkness 
they  passed  to  the  land  of  light." 

From  my  recital  of  antique   sins,   she  turned.     I 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  29 

could  see  her  looking  about,  noting  the  absence  of  arti 
cles  of  virtue.  Presently  she  said  and  I  thought  ap 
provingly  : 

"You  are  clockless." 

"Yes,  and  watchless  also.  Brain  workers  should  be. 
Watches  and  clocks  presuppose  things  to  be  done,  ap 
pointments  to  be  kept,  amusements  to  be  endured. 
They  presuppose  punctuality  which  is  the  thief  of 
time." 

She  was  good  enough  to  agree  with  me. 

From  time  we  passed  to  space.  We  talked  of  every 
thing  in  the  universe,  except  Einstein's  theory  of  it, 
which  would  have  been  premature.  Altogether  we 
talked  for  five  hours.  Never  but  once  before  had  I 
talked  so  long  to  a  woman  and  on  that  occasion  I  kept 
saying  the  same  thing  over  and  over  again.  Ulti 
mately  the  sun  leered  in.  It  leered  groggily,  as  though 
it  had  been  making  a  night  of  it,  and,  asking  her  per 
mission,  I  left  the  room,  went  out  and  around  the  cor 
ner,  ferreted  about,  unearthed  a  locksmith,  brought 
him  back,  set  him  to  work  and,  with  the  key  that  he 
made,  returned  to  her.  Her  arms  were  on  the  table, 
her  head  was  in  them,  her  hat  on  a  chair.  Sleep  had 
sunk  her  in  its  deep  lagoons. 

In  the  street  I  had  become  a  beast  of  burden,  lad- 
ened  with  crescents,  unsalted  butter,  fruit,  cream. 
These  I  took  to  the  kitchenette — horrible  word! — 
where  I  made  coffee.  While  the  pot  was  boiling  I 
arranged  a  tray.  To  embellish  the  tray,  I  took  from 
the  back  corner  of  the  cupboard's  top  shelf  a  Sevres 
cup  that  had  come  down  to  me  wrapped  in  tissue  paper. 
Other  things  that  had  come  with  it  had  gone  with  the 
diverted  bonds. 


30  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

On  that  early  morning,  with  the  tray  and  in  evening 
clothes,  I  must  have  looked  like  a  waiter  when,  rising 
from  those  lagoons,  she  looked  up. 

The  experience  of  awaking  in  the  rooms  of  a  stran 
ger  must,  I  thought,  be  a  novelty  to  her  and  I  wondered 
how  she  would  act.  Whatever  she  did  would  be  so 
much  copy. 

But  there  she  routed  me.  I  had  put  that  cup  before 
her.  She  took  it,  held  it,  her  head  went  back.  She 
seemed  to  be  considering  the  ceiling.  But  presently, 

UA  large  room.  A  man  with  a  white  beard.  A 
little  boy  in  blue.  The  old  man  is  drinking  from  a  cup. 
The  little  boy  is  showing  him  a  wooden  horse  painted 
yellow  " 

From  the  ceiling,  her  eyes  turned  to  me. 

"This  is  the  cup.    Who  are  the  people?" 

Dumbfounded,  I  stared.  What  else  could  I  do? 
For,  as  I  told  her,  the  old  man  was  my  grandfather 
and  I  the  little  boy.  But  this  intimate  demonstration 
of  psychometry,  which  is  the  rarest  and  most  curious 
of  gifts,  one  that  enables  the  gifted  to  tell  from  an 
object  where  the  object  has  been  and  what  occurred 
there,  this  miracle  astounded  me  and  I  told  her  that 
also. 

She  took  it  lightly,  with  a  light  smile.  Then,  at 
once,  she  presiding,  we  fell  to.  The  promenade  around 
the  corner  and  back  had  converted  me  into  a  hyena.  I 
ate  enormously,  growling  a  little,  as  I  suppose  hyenas 
do,  yet  only  at  my  own  forgetfulness.  I  had  omitted 
to  fetch  flowers.  But  then,  praise  God,  it  was  not  every 
day  that  I  breakfasted  with  a  beautiful  sibyl.  It  would 
have  been  too  disturbing. 

"You  live  alone?'5  I  asked. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  31 

A  few  hours  before  I  had  thought  her  face  noble 
and  reserved.  Over  the  coffee-pot  it  projected  an  in 
terior  radiance,  a  glow  clear  and  defined  as  mother- 
of-pearl. 

"No,  not  alone,"  she  answered.  "I  have  a  friend, 
Signor  Matouchi." 

Some  opera-singer,  I  thought. 

"He  has  the  most  ferocious  whiskers  you  ever  saw," 
she  added,  "and  he  will  be  sure  to  bite  me  if  I  do  not 
hurry." 

"Oh!"  I  said,  inanely  relieved,  for  what  business 
was  it  of  mine?  "Well,  give  him  my  love  and  perhaps 
you  will  let  me  add  a  saucer  of  cream." 

She  thanked  me,  gathered  her  hat  and  cloak,  took 
the  key,  thanked  me  again. 

I  saw  her  to  the  door,  where  I  gave  her  the  cream 
and  where  I  heard  Signor  Matouchi  meow.  After 
which,  I  went  to  bed,  slept  prodigiously  and  woke  from 
dreams  of  a  mime. 

For  days  he  had  haunted  me.  I  had  wanted,  if  pos 
sible,  to  produce  something  less  ordinary  than  ordinary 
fiction  and  I  had  thought  of  doing  a  pantomime  and  of 
calling  it  The  Chatterbox,  though,  as  I  look  back  now, 
I  think  the  title  came  first  and  the  idea  of  a  pantomime 
came  later.  What  better  title,  I  youthfully  reflected, 
could  a  dumbshow  have? 

The  galleys  of  my  last  iniquity  out  of  the  way,  I  got 
at  it.  Except  to  the  amateur,  the  getting  at  anything 
of  the  kind  is  a  form  of  labour  hard  as  a  bricklayer's, 
much  more  engrossing  and  far  less  useful.  It  held  me 
with  invisible  threads  that  were  firmer  than  rope. 
They  bound  and  gagged  me,  rendering  me,  as  the 


32  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

opiates  of  creative  dreams  do  render  one,  unfit  for 
human  companionship. 

I  did  not  forget  the  sibyl.  Twice,  in  the  hazards 
of  hall  and  stairway,  I  saw  and  saluted  her,  but  though 
indulgently  she  asked  me,  I  did  not  return  her  visit. 
I  did  not  forget  Bradish,  but  I  had  other  fish  to  fry. 
There  were  earthquakes.  Hermetically  I  ignored 
them.  Que  diable!  When  I  am  not  at  home,  I  am 
out.  Only  a  volcano  could  have  erupted  me. 

Meanwhile,  I  dressed  The  Chatterbox.  March 
went,  April  came.  There  were  skies  of  silk,  all  the 
surprises  and  surrenders  of  spring,  before  I  got  up 
from  it. 


IV 

THAT  day,  with  a  dozen  violets  in  the  lapel  of  a  coat 
that  still  said  Savile  Row,  I  went  junketing,  not  on 
Fifth  Avenue,  where  the  ornate  used  to  stroll  and 
where  they  stroll  no  longer,  but  to  the  east  of  upper 
Madison,  wondering  whether  I  might  not  happen  on 
some  flat  less  leprous  than  the  walkup.  Yet,  as  I  look 
back  now,  I  am  sure  the  junket  lacked  conviction.  Mov 
ing,  the  French  say,  is  a  little  death.  But  in  that  sense 
all  New  Yorkers  have  their  minor  deceases  and  it  was 
in  trying  to  incline  my  heart  that  I  wandered  through 
thick  streets,  thin  streets,  streets  of  gloating  windows, 
streets  of  obvious  disquiet,  streets  of  unaccountable 
beings,  until  finally,  entering  one  that  seemed  pregnant 
with  obscure  calamities,  I  happened  on  a  house  that 
had  a  Leah-like  air  of  desertion. 

On  it,  a  sign  informed  me  that  an  apartment  with 
all  conveniences  was  to  let  and  I  was  conjecturing  these 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  33 

conveniences   when,    from   the    entrance,   Austen    ap 
peared. 

Instantly  he  amazed  me. 

"I  was  just  thinking  of  you." 

I  stood  and  looked  at  him.  Soberly  and  admirably 
dressed,  he  was  the  portrait  of  Aramis  in  modern 
clothes. 

aAre  you  busy?"  he  asked. 

Drummers  retort  slid  from  me.    "  'Ants  and  people 
in  trade  are  busy.     Never  ask  a  gentleman  that.*  ' 
He  took  it  with  great  good  nature. 

"Come  in  and  let  me  offer  you  a  sherry  and  bitters." 

I  did  not  want  his  sherry  and  bitters.  It  was  the  sign 
and  the  conjectural  conveniences  that  tempted  me  and 
I  followed  him  up  two  flights  to  a  landing  where, 
through  the  open  door  of  an  empty  flat,  I  beheld  a 
scrubwoman. 

Leah,  I  told  myself. 

Adjacent  was  a  parallel  flat  into  which  he  showed 
me  and  then  into  a  room  that  had  an  air  careless  and 
insolent,  a  room  that  resembled  him,  except  that  it  was 
less  well-dressed.  There  was  a  sideboard,  a  table  cov 
ered  with  a  drooping  green  cloth,  the  usual  chairs,  a 
bookcase,  a  green  sofa  and  a  cupboard,  wide  open,  in 
which  coats  were  hanging,  fur  coats,  motor  coats,  rain 
coats,  top  coats,  coats  for  every  season  and,  it  may  be, 
of  every  colour.  He  closed  the  door  on  them,  rang, 
and  at  once,  as  though  sprung  from  a  trap,  a  civil-faced 
gnome  appeared. 

"Shall  it  be  a  cocktail?    Or  would  you  prefer " 

"A  drop  of  Polly,  if  you  have  it,"  I  told  him. 

"A  bottle  of  Apollinaris,"  he  said  to  the  gnome  who 
seemed  to  produce  it  at  once. 


34  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Look  here,  Poole,"  he  continued  as  the  servant  dis 
appeared,  "I  have  been  wanting  to  call  on  you  but  I 
could  not  discover  where  you  live.  You  are  a  member 
of  the  Buck,  aren't  you?  I  stopped  in  there  yester 
day,  and  asked  the  doorkeeper.  Of  course,  he  would 
not  tell  me,  but  I  thought,  in  asking,  that  I  might  find 
you  there." 

"The  flat  next  door  is  to  let,  is  it  not?"  I  appro 
priately  enquired. 

"Yes,  or  rather  no.  It  was  to  let  but  a  man  I  know 
has  taken  it.  Have  a  cigarette?" 

We  were  seated  at  the  table,  across  which  he  shoved 
a  case.  I  helped  myself  and  he  got  back  at  me. 

"What  I  wanted  to  see  you  about  is  Bradish." 

"Hello!"  I  exclaimed.  "How  is  he?  I  have  not 
seen  him  in  a  hundred  years.  What's  wrong  with  him." 

"He  is  too  confoundedly  rich." 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "it  is  disgusting." 

"He  ought  not  to  be  roaming  around  loose.  I  want 
him  to  keep  off  the  grass." 

What  grass  he  meant,  I  did  not  know,  but  the  ef 
frontery  of  it  was  beautiful  and  I  said  as  much. 

"Then  why  don't  you  tell  him  so?" 

"There  you  are !  If  I  did,  he  would  be  in  a  position 
to  tell  me  to  go  to  the  devil  and  I  would  have  to  swallow 
it.  You  know  Mrs.  Chilton?" 

I  drank  the  Polly.  ^Well  enough  to  bow  if  she 
bowed  first." 

"Here  it  is  then.  She  wants  to  make  a  match  be 
tween  him  and  her  daughter  and " 

"I  don't  see  that  that  is  any  business  of  ours." 

"It  is  my  business  at  any  rate  and  as  a  friend  of 
his  I  think  it  is  yours." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  35 

"Well,"  I  said,  "perhaps  it  is  your  business.  You  are 
a  relative,  aren't  you?" 

"A  good  lot  more  than  that.  I  have  known  Miss 
Chilton  ever  since  she  was  a  little  girl.  I  am  about 
the  only  man  she  can  turn  to  and " 

He  looked  away. 

Everybody  likes  to  be  confidential,  if  they  can  be  so 
to  someone  who  will  accompany  them  on  the  harp. 
But  for  the  harp  there  must  be  intimacy.  Between 
Austen  and  myself  there  was  none  and  I  understood 
why  he  looked  away. 

"But,"  he  at  once  resumed,  "that  is  neither  here 
nor  there.  The  point  is  that  Miss  Chilton  is  interested 
in  someone  else  and  it  seemed  to  me  that  if  you  would 
say  a  word " 

"Good  Lord  1"  I  interrupted.  "You  speak  as  though 
he  were  persecuting  her.  That  is  not  Bradish." 

"No.  Certainly  not.  It  is  her  mother.  She  is  doing 
what  she  can  to  force  her  to  take  him  and  it  is  for  that 
reason  I  thought  you  might " 

"Never  in  the  world.  It  would  not  help  in  the  least. 
On  the  contrary " 

"But  see  here " 

"You  don't  know  Bradish.  Any  interference  makes 
him  mulish  and  I  don't  blame  him.  I  can  be  mulish 
myself.  If  I  had  his  money  I  would  be  a  wilderness  of 
mules.  Great  Scott!  What  is  the  use  of  being  rich  as 
all  outdoors  if  you  can't  tell  anybody  and  everybody 
to  go  to  the  devil." 

"Precisely,  and  that  is  just  what  I  want  him  to  say 
to  Mrs.  Chilton.  If  he  doesn't,  look  here,  Poole,  if 
he  doesn't,  he  is  going  to  regret  it." 

I  laughed.    "Is  that  a  threat?" 


36  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"You  misunderstand  me.  He  is  not  the  man  for 
Miss  Chilton.  I  don't  mean  because  of  his  unfortu 
nate  appearance.  If  he  were  Phoebus  Apollo  it  would 
be  quite  the  same.  He  does  not  appeal  to  her,  not  in 
the  least.  But  her  mother  is  so  jockeying  her  that  she 
may  run  her  into  it.  In  that  case  what  sort  of  an 
existence  can  he  expect  to  lead." 

uHe  hasn't  told  me." 

"Isn't  it  obvious  though?  I  may  be  in  error,  but 
I'll  wager  he  is  as  material  as  they  make  'em." 

"So  am  I." 

Gracefully  he  yielded  it.    "I  fear  I  am  also." 

"Well  then?" 

"But  Miss  Chilton  is  just  the  opposite.  Miss  Chil 
ton  is  as  spiritual  as  he  is  the  reverse." 

For  a  cited  beauty,  a  beauty  of  her  type  and  headi- 
ness  that,  ordinarily,  would  have  been  a  bit  thick.  Yet, 
I  knew  it  to  be  true.  In  her  face  were  raptures.  There 
were  lilies  in  her  thoughts.  But  that  did  not  help 
matters.  Even  otherwise  the  matter  did  not  concern 
me  and  I  got  up  to  go. 

He,  too,  got  up. 

"Put  in  a  word,  Poole.  You  will  be  doing  him  a 
good  turn." 

You  mean  I  will  be  doing  you  one,  I  thought,  for  I 
saw  through  it  then. 

But  he  laughed  or  affected  to  laugh  and  added: 

"I  don't  pretend  to  know  Bradish,  but  I  do  know 
Mrs.  Chilton  and  that  is  enough." 

He  said  it  as  he  went  with  me  to  the  door,  where 
he  thanked  me  and  saw  me  out. 

On  the  landing  Leah  stood,  a  pail  in  one  hand,  a 
mop  in  the  other. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  37 

As  I  went  down  the  stair,  I  little  dreamed  in  what 
curious  and  tragic  circumstances  I  was  to  recall  having 
seen  her  there.  What  occupied  me  was  my  lucky 
squeak.  By  not  more  than  a  hair  I  had  missed  having 
Austen  for  a  neighbour.  He  would  have  been  way 
laying  and  buttonholing  me  till  I  died. 

Yet,  as  I  afterward  recognised,  it  was  fateful  for 
him,  and  not  only  for  him  but  for  all  concerned,  that 
he  had  buttonholed  me  at  all. 

I  made  straight  for  Bradish's  house. 


SINCE  then,  in  looking  back,  there  have  been  mo 
ments  when  it  seemed  to  me  that  that  moment  was 
pivotal,  that  of  all  that  afterward  happened  I  was  then 
the  direct  agent.  There  have  been  other  moments  when 
it  seemed  to  me  that  it  must  all  have  happened  anyway. 
The  latter  view  is  the  more  reasonable,  the  former 
more  ambitious.  As  yet,  I  have  made  no  choice. 

Even  when  the  servant  told  me  that  Bradish  was 
not  at  home,  even  then,  if  I  had  gone  away,  the  course 
of  events  must  have  swerved,  though  it  is  probable 
that  sooner  or  later  they  would  have  reassembled  in 
their  designed  combination.  The  old  idea  of  the  spi- 
derous  fates  that  sit  and  spin  is  picturesque,  as  any 
allegory  should  be.  But  behind  the  curtain,  forces 
which  we  ourselves  have  created,  play  on  us  and  on  our 
lives.  The  fates  that  sit  and  spin  are  our  own  fingers. 
The  spell  they  cast  is  destiny  self-made. 

These  views,  certainly  superficial,  came  to  me  long 
later.  At  the  moment  I  had  turned  to  go.  Before  me 
on  the  pavement  a  man  passed  and  nodded.  That 


38  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

was  the  pivotal  moment.  The  trivial  incident  arrested 
me  and  telling  the  servant  I  would  wait  I  went  on  and 
in  to  the  library. 

Former  Bradishes  had  been  intensely  respectable 
and  equally  dull.  They  were  what,  I  believe,  was  called 
strict  Presbyterians.  Upstairs,  in  the  rooms  that  ex 
tended  from  the  gallery,  some  of  their  remains  were 
covered  with  horsehair.  In  this  room  other  remains 
survived — a  severe  carpet,  a  calvanistic  table,  stern 
bookshelves,  straitlaced  chairs.  In  a  corner  was  the 
ugliest  piece  of  statuary  I  ever  saw.  On  the  table  was 
the  biggest  and  ugliest  inkpot  ever  made. 

From  a  wall,  Bradish's  father  looked  down,  very 
much,  I  suppose,  as  he  had  looked  at  these  things  when 
they  all  lived  with  him  in  Washington  Square.  More 
over,  in  an  adjoining  room,  that  gave  on  the  street,  were 
other  felicities.  The  adjoining  room,  through  which 
one  had  to  pass  to  reach  the  library,  was  the  real  cham 
ber  of  horrors.  There  Bradish  received  tiresome 
people,  lawyers,  agents  and  the  like.  Why,  with  all  his 
wealth,  he  received  them  at  all;  why  he  stuck  to  the 
damning  evidence  of  ancestral  taste,  these  were  mys 
teries  from  which  I  shrank. 

But  it  was  not  all  horror.  On  this  day  in  that  library 
I  found  an  old  friend  who  always  had  something 
new  to  say,  in  which  he  differed  vastly  from  other  peo 
ple  of  my  acquaintance.  His  name  is  Hugo's  Shakes 
peare.  The  pages  turn  to  the  sound  of  trumpets,  to 
the  long  parade  of  genius.  The  book  is  just  what  a 
book  should  be,  perfectly  impossible  and  equally  exalt 
ing. 

A  moment  and  the  pageantry  took  me.  I  was  floating 
from  height  to  height,  from  prophet  to  seer,  hovering, 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  39 

a  lost  soul,  before  thrones  in  the  ideal,  passing  from 
Isaiah  and  ^Eschylus,  up  through  the  ages  to  Hugo 
himself.  Then  abruptly,  a  titan  reached  and  hurled 
me.  Shot  through  space  I  was  on  earth  again,  in  a 
highly  uncomfortable  chair,  facing  the  insults  that  fell. 

"What  a  beast  you  are  I" 

I  shied  the  book.  Bradish  caught  it  and  sat  down 
before  me. 

With  the  disposition  of  a  sundial — over  which  clouds 
will  pass — the  spider,  at  that  moment,  made  him,  as  in 
moments  of  excitement  it  often  did  make  him,  unaf 
fectedly  hideous.  Familiarity  breeds  many  things. 
Usually  I  did  not  notice.  I  could  not  help  noticing  it 
then.  It  seemed  about  to  spring. 

He  motioned.  "I  have  gone  to  you.  I  have  sent. 
The  janitor  said  you  were  dead.  What  sort  of  a  chap 
are  you?" 

"A  mere  pilgrim.     What's  wrong?" 

"I  am  in  hell." 

"Look  out,"  I  told  him,  and  far  better  than  I  knew. 
"There  is  always  a  deeper  one.  How  did  you  get 
there?" 

He  put  the  Hugo  on  the  table. 

"It's  Miss  Chilton." 

"See  here,"  I  said.  "An  hour  ago  Austen  had  the 
cheek  to  say  you  must  keep  off  the  grass." 

Bradish  stared.     "He  has  been  at  you,  has  he?" 

"He  got  me  in  his  rooms  and  used  me  as  a  sewer. 
It  appears  that  if  you  don't  look  out  you'll  get  let  in." 

He  started.    "I  will,  eh  ?    By  whom  then  ?" 

"Her  mother.     He  said  she  would  jockey  you  into 


a  corner." 


40  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Gammon!  She  is  in  a  corner  herself  and  a  pretty 
tight  one.  The  woman  hasn't  a  penny." 

"There's  the  Chilton  place." 

"Mortgaged.  Blanketed  up  to  the  roof,  even  to  the 
vault  there." 

"Vault?     What  vault?" 

"In  colonial  days  every  manor  had  its  own  cemetery. 
The  Chiltons  have  theirs." 

He  was  becoming  historical,  wandering  away  from 
it  and,  glad  of  it,  I  let  him  run  on,  but  he  did  not  run 
far.  In  a  moment  he  was  back  again. 

"Her  mother  is  afraid  they'll  bolt." 

I  hoped  they  would.  I  omitted  to  say  so  however. 
Instead,  I  became  sympathetic. 

"Jim,  if  this  were  a  novel  of  mine,  I  would  make  the 
hero — you  are  the  hero — show  himself  in  such  fine 
colours  that  the  lady  would  jump  down  his  throat." 

"Yes,  you  would  be  sure  to  write  just  such  rubbish." 

Pausing,  he  smoothed  the  table,  which  was  entirely 
unruffled. 

"I  have,  I  suppose,  a  dollar  or  two.  I  have  also,  I 
suppose,  a  year  or  two  ahead  of  me.  I  would  give  them 
all,  everything  I  can  claim  in  this  world,  everything  I 
may  hope  for  in  the  next,  if " 

He  broke  it  off,  but  I  followed  it  and  I  thought, 
isn't  it  wonderful  how  the  illusion  of  happiness  which 
the  idea  of  union  with  another  can  create,  will  pack  a 
sane  man's  head  with  insanities.  He  thinks  himself 
wholly  in  love  with  this  girl  and  what  he  loves  is  not 
the  girl  but  his  idea  of  her.  Any  girl  that  resembled 
her  would  do  as  well.  At  which,  up  before  me,  surged 
that  sibyl.  Nelly  Chilton  and  Aly  Bolton  were  alike 
as  two  roses. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  41 

Meanwhile,  painfully  he  was  at  it.     "It's  my  face." 

"Nonsense,"  I  told  him  and  I  meant  it.  For  a 
woman  must  be  loved,  though  it  be  by  a  monster,  per 
haps  particularly  by  a  monster,  provided  that  what  it 
is  conventional  to  call  her  affections  are  not  otherwise 
involved. 

"Hasn't  Austen  anything?"  I  asked. 

"Enough  to  pay  his  tailor." 

There  had  been  an  hour  when  even  that  potentiality 
had  seemed  chimerical  to  me  and  I  might  have  said  as 
much  but,  at  the  moment,  Peters  announced  that  lunch 
eon  was  served. 

Bradish  got  up.     "Comeonski." 

I,  too,  got  up  and,  preceding  him,  went  through  the 
chamber  of  horrors  and  crossed  the  hall  where  Peters 
was  opening  the  front  door.  I  passed  on  and  had  en 
tered  the  drawing-room  when  I  heard  a  man  speaking 
rapidly,  in  English,  but  with  the  unmistakable  accent 
of  France. 

"Mr.  Bradish?  I  am  fortunate  to  find  you.  Is  this 
yours?" 

I  turned.  The  man's  back  was  to  the  light.  I  could 
not  see  his  face,  but  I  could  see  Jim's.  He  was  looking 
at  a  strip  of  paper  which  the  man  held  out  to  him — 
and  held  on  to  also — and,  in  looking,  his  face  had 
grown  vicious.  Usually  very  civil  to  everyone,  but 
already  out  of  temper  and  angered  by  the  abrupt  intru 
sion,  not  only  his  expression  was  vicious,  his  voice  was 
also. 

"Never  saw  it  before  or  you  either.  Peters,  put 
him  out." 

"Ah,  flute  alors  et  bien  merci!" 

The  man  wheeled,  he  went,  the  door  closed  and  I 


42  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

passed  on  through  the  black  and  yellow  room  and  then 
through  the  portieres  that  hung  between  it  and  the 
pseudo-baronial  hall. 

Bradish  was  at  my  heels  and  as  I  seated  myself 
I  put  it  to  him. 

" Who  is  your  friend?" 

Vicious  still,  he  barked.  "How  do  I  know?  He 
had  a  cheque  drawn  to  somebody  or  other  with  what 
purported  to  be  my  signature." 

"A  forgery?" 

He  flung  out  his  napkin.  "What  else?  They  will 
spot  it  quick  enough  at  the  bank." 

"What  was  the  tune?" 

"Four  thousand  and  odd." 

"But  look  here.  Are  you  sure  it  is  not  some  cheque 
of  yours  that  has  been  raised?" 

"Even  so,  it  would  not  matter." 

He  was  wrong  in  that  and  I  told  him  so. 

He  washed  a  clam  down  with  chablis  and  exploded 
a  "Ha!"  to  which  he  added:  "Ever  notice  the  little 
joker  on  a  Bank  of  England  note?" 

"What  little  joker?" 

"On  the  left  side  of  the  second  letter  of  the  word 
that  tells  the  amount,  there  is  a  microscopic  white 
speck.  Unless  you  knew  of  it,  never  in  the  world  would 
you  see  it  was  there." 

"What  of  it?" 

"Before  the  second  letter  of  my  name  on  my  cheques 
I  put  a  little  pen  prick.  The  tellers  look  for  it  first." 

"Such  originality  is  stupendous." 

He  put  it  from  him.     "It  was  my  father's  idea." 

And  what  an  old  smarty  he  must  have  been,  I 
thought.  But  I  said,  "Well,  if  you  slip  up  on  this 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  43 

cheque  it  won't  hurt  you.  I  would  be  ashamed  myself 
to  be  as  rich  as  you  are." 

He  shoved  at  his  plate.     "You  do  talk  such  rot." 

It  was  sheer  envy  on  his  part.  He  wanted  to  talk 
it  himself.  He  wanted  to  trot  Nelly  Chilton  out  again. 
If  you  are  gone  on  a  girl  you  must  talk  of  her  even  if 
you  have  to  talk  to  yourself.  He  could  not.  The 
presence  of  Peters  and  Gedney  prevented.  Conscious 
of  which  angrily  he  ate  and  savagely  he  drank. 

What  were  the  courses  that  followed,  I  have  for 
gotten  but  finally  coffee  came  and  to  my  regret  the 
servants  withdrew. 

Then  at  once  he  was  back  to  his  muttons,  endlessly, 
da  capo  and  all  over  again  until,  after  a  full  hour  of 
them,  Peters,  to  my  joy,  looked  in. 

"Mrs.  Chilton,  sir." 

Enter  the  villain,  I  thought. 

Bradish  got  up  and  half-turned.     "Wait  here." 

The  portieres  received  him.  They  had  parted  and 
through  the  parting  his  voice  floated  back. 

"This  is  so  nice  of  you.    Have  you  had  luncheon?*' 

"Luncheon  1"  She  seemed  to  spit  it.  "I  am  drown 
ing." 

"Do  sit  down." 

"I  tell  you  I  am  drowning  and  you  ask  me  to  sit." 

"But " 

I  could  almost  see  him  floundering  with  her. 

"I  want  your  help,"  she  was  saying.  "You  have  got 
to  help  me." 

That  "got"  was  in  italics. 

"Certainly.  Of  course."  I  could  hear  him  reply. 
"What  is  it?" 

Slow  music,  I  thought. 


44  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"How  can  I  tell  you?"  But  she  must  have  known,  for 
immediately  she  added,  "I  am  in  the  hands  of " 

Her  voice  had  lowered.  I  could  not  hear  her.  I 
heard  him  though. 

"A  blackmailer!" 

At  her  age !    I  thought. 

Again  her  voice  had  sunk  to  inaudible  levels.  Yet 
presently  a  word  swam  up,  a  word  of  good  omen.  It 
was  Bonheur,  which  means  happiness,  I  believe,  though 
hardly  when  it  rhymes  with  Chanteur,  for  that  means 
blackmailer,  in  French  at  any  rate.  Then,  before  I 
could  put  them  together,  a  question  rang  frank  as  a 
sword  thrust. 

"Why  don't  you  marry  her?" 

From  before  it,  he  must  have  backed. 

"Why  don't  I  ?    Good  heavens,  she " 

"Take  her  by  storm !  Go  at  her  hammer  and  tongs ! 
Carry  her  off  her  feet!  God,  if  I  were  a  man " 

He  must  have  got  his  wind.  "It  isn't  that.  I  would 
pick  her  up  and  run  to  the  moon  with  her.  There 
is  nothing  I  wouldn't  do,  nothing!  But " 

"I  know,"  I  heard  her  cry.  "I  know.  'God  help 
me,'  she  told  me,  me  her  mother,  'it  is  either  Fred  or 
a  convent.'  A  convent !  With  her  looks !  I  shall  go 
mad." 

She  seemed  to  tear  the  words,  they  came  from  her 
in  tatters  and  I  could  fancy  her  lifting  her  hands,  wring 
ing  them,  crossing  and  recrossing  the  room,  and  I 
feared  Bradish  would  say,  "Calm  yourself." 

But  at  once  she  was  at  him  from  another  angle. 

"This  painted  beast,  what  am  I  to  do  with  him? 
Only  don't  tell  me  I  am  a  beast  myself.  I  am  a  beast. 
I  know  it.  But  what  is  the  amount  to  you?  Besides, 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  45 

I  thought  you  would  never  notice,  or  at  least  that  I 
could  make  it  good  before  you  did.    Now " 

"You  might  better  have  asked  me,"  Bradish  boomed 
in.  "You  could  have  had  it  and  welcome.  As  it  is 
I'll  take  it  up.  I  can't  do  less." 

"But  there  you  are.  He  says  only  Nelly  her 
self " 

Again  her  voice  sank  and  again  his  swam  up. 

"I'll  beat  him  to  jelly  first." 

She  made  some  sound,  a  sort  of  rasping  laugh. 
"Much  good  it  would  do  for  us  both  to  be  in  Sing 
Sing — so  near  the  manor,  too." 

At  that  fine  levity  some  plan  must  have  occurred 
to  him.  In  any  event  he  suggested  one. 

"Go  there.  Go  there  now,  today,  as  fast  as  you  can. 
She  does  not  know,  does  she?" 

"Not  yet." 

"Don't  tell  her  then.    I'll  settle  him  somehow." 

"But  of  course  I  shall  tell  her.  She  can't  refuse 
you  then." 

"No,  no.    It  wouldn't  be  fair." 

"Leave  it  to  me,"  I  heard  her  say  and  abruptly,  for 
the  first  time,  I  realised  that  I  should  not  have  heard 
her  at  all.  I  felt  as  one  may  who  has  been  listening  at 
a  keyhole.  The  feeling  gave  me  a  twist  in  the  head. 

I  got  up  and  went  to  one  of  the  windows  from  which, 
in  the  garden  below,  I  saw  a  fat  man,  all  in  white,  a 
white  linen  baretta  on  his  head,  tormenting  a  dove- 
coloured  peacock.  Momentarily  the  picture  distracted 
me.  But  snatches  from  the  duo  kept  returning.  They 
were  like  lines  in  a  melodrama.  In  particular,  one 
stood  out:  "It  is  either  Fred  or  a  convent." 

Fred,  I  assumed,  was  Austen. 


46  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

The  fat  man,  who  wore  a  third  empire  imperial 
pulled  at  it  and  looked  up.  I  moved  away  and,  as  I 
turned,  Bradish  came  in. 

"Has  she  gone?"  I  asked. 

"The  Lord  be  praised." 

"Look  here,  Jim.  Beat  me  if  you  like.  I  overheard 
a  lot  of  it." 

He  sat  down,  helped  himself  to  a  glass  of  brandy  and 
looked  over  at  me. 

"That  chap  with  the  cheque  was  Bonheur  et  Cie. 
Ever  hear  of  him?" 

"Yes,  and  of  Chanteur  et  Cie,  and  so  have  you.  You 
might  have  known  better  than  to  be  so  quick  with 
him.  I  must  say  you  botched  it  famously." 

"That's  right.     Put  me  in  the  wrong." 

"You  put  yourself  there." 

"But  how  was  I  to  know?  He  shoved  the  damned 
cheque  at  me  and  asked  if  it  were  mine.  What  else 
was  there  for  me  to  do  except  send  him  to  the  devil?" 

"Well,  now  you  can  go  after  him." 

"I  can,  can  I?     Then  you  didn't  hear  his  terms." 

"He  didn't  mention  any." 

"Not  here.  But  from  here  he  went  straight  to  Mrs. 
Chilton.  What  do  they  give  you?" 

"For  blackmail?" 

"Forgery." 

"Three  or  four  years  I  fancy.  It  depends  on  how 
polite  you  are  to  the  judge.  But  that  is  all  nonsense. 
You  have  only  to  say  the  cheque  is  yours  and  that  is 
the  end  of  it." 

"I  would  have  to  say  it  in  court.  Besides  there 
would  be  experts." 

"Your  testimony  would  prevail." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  47 

"But  think  of  the  papers!  Think  of  the  mess !  He 
says  I  disowned  it  in  the  presence  of  witnesses  and 
that  either  Mrs.  Chilton  can  go  to  jail  or  else  her 
daughter  can  come  and  see  him.  Those  are  his  terms." 
It  was  like  a  page  from  Balzac.  It  revolted  me  and 
I  rounded  on  him. 

"What  did  you  mean  then  by  saying  you  would  settle 
him?" 

"I  meant  I  would  lay  him  out,  I  suppose." 
But  that  seemed  very  imbecile  and  to  show  no  doubt 
that  I  could  be  an  imbecile  too — which  I  was —  I  said 
what  afterward  I  could  have  bitten  my  tongue  off  for. 
"Suppose  you  let  me  take  a  hand." 
"If  you  only  could,  but  how  can  you?" 
"I  heard  you  tell  Mrs.  Chilton  to  take  her  daughter 
and  go  to  the  manor.     Did  she  say  she  would?" 
"Yes,  today,  this  afternoon." 
"Follow  them  then  and  stand  guard." 
The    strategy   was    amateur    and,    what   is   worse, 
catastrophic.     But  he  jumped  at  it.     I  could  see  him 
picturing  himself  with  outstretched  hands,  hands  that 
dripped  with  money,  protecting  two  women,  one  who 
was  certainly  no  better  than  she  ought  to  be,  and  the 
other  too  good  perhaps  for  mortal  man. 

"Meanwhile,"  I  added,  "I  will  hold  the  blackmailer 
up." 

"How?" 

"I  can't  say.  I  don't  know.  But  I  will.  At  all 
events  I'll  try." 

It  was  then  I  put  my  foot  in  it.  At  the  time  the 
door  was  open,  wide  open.  It  was  I  that  gave  it  the 
first  shove.  That  I  meant  well  has  nothing  to  do  with 


48  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

it,  or  rather  it  has.  Well-meaning  people  do  the  most 
harm. 

"There  is  an  inn  there,"  he  was  saying.  "I'll  put 

up  at  it.  Perhaps "  He  broke  off.  He  looked 

away.  At  what?  I  do  not  know.  But  almost  at  once 
he  took  it  up  again.  "Well,  you  never  can  tell.  When 
I  am  out  there  with  them,  she  may  reconsider  it." 
Again  he  looked  away,  then  at  me.  "If  I  wire  you, 
you  will  join  me,  won't  you?" 

I  stood  up.  "If  you  wire,  I'll  never  get  it.  Tele 
phone  here.  I'll  be  in  tomorrow.  It  may  be  that 
by  that  time  this  creature  will  have  changed  his  tune. 
If  not " 

He  nodded  at  me.    "In  that  case,  I'll  ask  her  again." 

I  did  not  follow  him  and  I  told  him  so. 

"If  Nelly  marries  me,  the  cheque,  whether  good  or 
bad,  won't  make  a  wrinkle." 

"I  suppose  not,"  I  said.  But  I  was  thinking  of  some 
thing  else,  and  I  added:  "Whom  will  you  take  with 
you?" 

"Mike." 

"Hold  on.  Send  a  line  to  the  bank.  Say  you  guarantee 
the  signature.  And  I  may  need  Peters.  Tell  him  so. 
While  you  are  at  it,  tell  him  to  pack  your  things.  Then 
hurry  out  there  as  fast  as  you  can." 

He  saw  me  to  the  door.  As  I  went  down  the  steps 
a  motor  passed.  In  it  was  a  man  with  a  dyed  mus 
tache.  I  did  not  know  him  from  Adam,  but  the  mus 
tache  reminded  me  of  another,  whose  owner,  a  friend 
of  mine,  I  had  been  of  some  slight  service  to  the  year 
before.  Among  New  Yorkers,  gratitude  is  phenom 
enal.  My  friend  was  a  Dublin  man  and  at  the  time — 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  49 

the  poor  devil  has  since  passed  over — he  chiefed  it  at 
Police  Headquarters. 

A  taxi  took  me  there.  On  the  way,  I  evolved  a 
series  of  schemes  that  had  in  view  the  rout  and  ruin 
of  Bonheur  et  Cie.  I  have  forgotten  them  all  now 
and  I  regret  it.  They  would  have  fitted  any  novel, 
however  poor. 

At  Headquarters,  then  in  Mulberry  Street,  I  found 
my  friend  in  the  front  room,  which  resembled  a  real 
estate  office,  and  where,  although  he  presented  the 
forbidding  appearance  of  an  auctioneer,  he  greeted  me 
with  an  affability  that  was  painful. 

"Me  boy,  you  will  just  put  your  fist  to  this." 

He  had  leaned  over,  fished  from  somewhere  a  copy 
of  my  last  turpitude  and  produced  a  fountain  pen.  It 
made  me  feel  like  Ainsworth,  who  contrived  to  be  the 
author  of  a  hundred  novels  and  a  thousand  crimes. 

As  it  happened,  he  knew  nothing  of  Bonheur  and  he 
sent  for  a  vulture-eyed  man  with  a  battered  beak  who 
knew  less. 

Meanwhile,  without  mentioning  names,  I  had  given 
him  the  facts. 

uAnd  a  Frenchman  is  he,  me  boy?  Sure  as  you  live 
if  he  is  that  kind  of  a  bullfrog,  he's  wanted  over  there 
and  that's  why  he's  here.  I'll  send  one  of  the  lads 
to  give  him  the  look-over.  Drop  in  tomorrow.  I 
may  have  him  in  chains." 

I  took  it  of  course  at  its  face  value.  None  the  less 
it  gave  me  an  idea. 


So  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

VI 

THE  next  forenoon  I  rang  at  Bradish's  door.  Ged- 
ney  opened,  but,  as  usual,  Peters  was  in  the  hall. 

"Has  Mr.  Bradish  telephoned?"  I  asked  him. 

"Yes,  sir.  Just  now.  I  said  you  were  not  here,  sir. 
Mr.  Bradish  said  he  would  call  up  again  in  an  hour." 

"Where  is  your  hat?" 

"My  'at,  sir?" 

"Call  a  cab,  please,  Peters,  and  come  with  me.  I 
won't  keep  you  long  and  I  may  not  need  you  at  all.  I 
am  going  to  a  shop  on  the  avenue.  When  we  get  there, 
you  stand  by  the  door." 

"Yes,  sir.  Beg  pardon,  sir.  May  I  ask  what  it  is 
about?" 

"A  crook  who  is  trying  to  get  the  better  of  Mr. 
Bradish." 

Peters  was  as  straight  and  probably  as  strong  as  a 
grenadier.  But,  a  professional  man,  he  wore  the  pro 
fessional  mask.  It  was  wooden.  None  the  less  a 
corner  of  his  lip  had  lifted  very  much  as  a  dog's  does 
when  about  to  bite. 

"Thank  you,  sir.    I'll  have  the  cab  in  a  moment." 

The  Maison  Bonheur  was  on  the  ground  floor.  It 
has  gone  since  but,  at  the  time,  a  small  groom  stood 
at  the  door;  a  tall  commissionaire  on  the  curb.  The 
window,  very  spacious,  delicately  hung,  exposed  noth 
ing  so  commercial  as  anything  for  sale. 

As  I  entered,  a  young  person  in  black  arched  her 
eyebrows  at  me.  The  room,  behind  which  extended  a 
suite  of  other  rooms,  was  fitted  with  mirrors,  with 
brocaded  chairs,  with  a  table  that  shone.  At  the 
moment,  a  woman,  whom  I  judged  a  topnotcher,  was 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  51 

talking  to  another  woman,  whom  I  took  for  a  premiere. 
But  the  young  person  had  approached. 

"Yes,  sir?" 

"Tell  Bonheur  to  come  here." 

"Who  shall  I  say?" 

"Say  it's  a  man  who  wants  a  word  with  him  and  who 
won't  dilly-dally  about  it  either." 

The  topnotcher  looked  from  the  premiere  at  me  and 
from  me  at  the  premiere.  The  latter  stared.  But  the 
young  person  had  gone  and  I  sat  down. 

Then  almost  at  once,  followed  by  the  young  person, 
the  dressmaker  appeared. 

"I  am  Mr.  Bonheur.    What  is  your  business?" 

More  for  copy  purposes  than  anything  else,  I  looked 
him  up  and  down. 

Bradish  was  not  Adonis,  but  you  never  would  have 
mistaken  him  for  any  but  the  right  sort.  The  dress 
maker  had  blue-black  hair  that  was  curled;  dark,  crafty 
eyes;  lashes  so  long  that  they  were  probably  false;  a 
straight  nose,  lips  full  and  painted,  a  powdered  chin,  a 
loose  tie,  an  embroidered  waistcoat,  a  coat  that  fitted 
like  a  mannequin's,  tight  trousers,  purple  socks,  patent 
leather  pumps,  the  air  of  a  coiffeur  and  an  odour  of 
musk.  A  chambermaid  might  have  thought  him  attrac 
tive.  I  thought  of  what  my  friend  at  Headquarters 
had  said  and  in  French  straight  at  him,  I  threw  it. 

"I  have  seen  you  before." 

"You  have  the  advantage  of  me." 

"Every  advantage.  The  last  time  I  saw  you  was  in 
the  Cour  d'Assises." 

I  flung  the  words  at  him  like  so  many  stones.  I  could 
see  them  land.  I  could  see  him  wilt.  I  could  see  him 
going  mentally  down  under  them.  With  what  he  had 


52  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

been  charged  in  that  Paris  court,  he  knew.  I  did  not 
know.  But  he  thought  I  knew  and  the  stones  were 
effective.  Through  mere  chance,  at  the  very  start,  I 
had  him.  The  rest  was  easy.  But  I  threw  a  few  more. 

"Your  name  is  not  Bonheur.  It  is  Chanteur.  Yes 
terday  I  cabled  your  description  to  Paris." 

It  was  not  very  pretty  of  me  to  lie  like  that.  But  a 
chap  who  won't  lie  for  a  woman  may  be  a  Christian, 
he  is  also  a  duffer. 

He  had  extended  his  hands.  "Mais!  Mais!  Com- 
prends  pas" 

"Yes,  you  do.  You  have  a  cheque  that  Mr.  Bradish 
signed.  You  are  trying  to  blackmail  a  client  with  it." 

He  smiled.  It  is  rare  to  see  such  a  smile.  Entirely 
muscular,  it  revealed  the  teeth  and  left  the  crafty  eyes 
unaltered. 

"Je  vois  bien  maintenant.  It  is  a  misunderstanding. 
I  have  no  cheque  signed  by  Mr.  Bradish." 

"You  have  a  cheque  that  you  brought  to  his  house. 
That  cheque  I  saw  him  sign." 

"Another  cheque,  yes.  But  not  this  cheque.  In  the 
presence  of  a  domestic  he  disowned  it." 

I  turned.  In  the  doorway,  beside  the  little  groom, 
Peters  stood.  I  motioned  at  him.  In  he  came. 

"Ever  seen  this  man  before?" 

"Yes,  sir.    Yesterday." 

"Where  was  that?" 

"In  the  hall  at  Mr.  Bradish's,  sir." 

"Did  you  see  a  cheque,  or  hear  anything  about  one?" 

"No,  sir,  I  did  not." 

The  dressmaker  shrieked  it.  "II  ment.  C'est 
puant" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  53 

Peters  edged  nearer.  "Beg  pardon,  sir.  May  I 
ask  what  he  said?" 

I  smiled  at  him.  "He  complimented  you  on  the  ease 
with  which  he  says  you  lie." 

Peters  had  removed  his  hat.  He  put  it  on.  In  put 
ting  it  on  he  removed  his  mask.  The  professional  man 
had  gone.  Peters  had  emerged  into  private  life. 

"For  tuppence,  I'd  knock  your  head  off.  Call  me  a 
liar  and  I'll  knock  it  for  nothing." 

I  motioned  at  him.    "That  will  do,  Peters." 

At  once  the  professional  man  returned.  The  mask 
was  resumed. 

"Thank  you,  sir." 

I  looked  at  the  dressmaker.  "Mr.  Bradish  has  gone 
from  town.  Two  ladies,  who  were  misguided  enough 
to  come  here,  have  gone  also.  But  I  remain  and  I'll 
tell  you  one  thing.  I'll  tell  you  two  of  them.  You 
can  present  that  cheque  or  you  can  preserve  it.  But  if 
I  hear  of  so  much  as  a  peep  from  you  about  it,  I  will 
first  lay  you  out  and  then  hand  you  over  to  the  police." 

I  stood  up  and  passed  on.  As  I  went  I  saw  him  in  a 
mirror.  He  was  wiping  his  face.  Alarmed,  the  top- 
notcher  must  have  fled.  But  I  could  see  the  premiere 
and  the  young  person  considering  him  with  slanting 
eyes. 

VII 

AT  the  Buck  Club,  just  around  the  corner,  I  had  a 
truffled  omelette,  a  cutlet  in  curlpapers,  admirable 
service,  the  day  ahead  of  me,  but  as  yet  no  word. 

On  vacating  the  Maison  Malheur  which,  I  fear  I 
vacated  rather  magnificently,  but  at  the  time  I  was 


54  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

rather  young,  I  told  Peters  to  go  back  to  the  house  and, 
when  the  telephone  asked  for  me,  to  have  me  called  at 
this  club,  where  I  then  instructed  the  operator  to  take 
down  any  message  and  send  it  to  the  dining-room  on 
the  floor  above. 

Vain  oblations,  though  how  disastrously  vain,  I  did 
not  realise  until  later.  Meanwhile,  the  dishes  gone,  I 
sat  and  smoked,  exchanged  the  time  of  day  with  a  man 
I  did  not  know  from  Adam  and  was  wondering  vaguely 
why  I  bothered  to  talk  to  him  at  all,  when  the  message 
came,  a  few  words  from  Peters  to  the  effect  that  Mr. 
Bradish  had  not  telephoned,  that  he  had  hurried  in, 
got  the  upshot  of  things  and  had  hurried  away,  leaving 
word  that  I  was  to  be  at  the  Chilton  place  on  the 
morrow  by  noon. 

The  upshot  of  things?  I  uncomfortably  meditated, 
as  I  went  down  and  kicked  my  heels  in  the  main  room, 
what  the  dickens  did  Peters  imagine  was  the  upshot? 
The  stones  I  had  thrown,  had  been  thrown  in  French 
and  although  he  had  seen  some  of  them  flying,  he 
might  have  misjudged  their  effect. 

For  one  mad  moment,  I  thought  of  telephoning  to 
him>  the  next  instant  sanity  returned.  I  knew  I  could 
not.  Even  the  sight  of  a  telephone  horripilates  me 
and  in  my  trade  one  has  to  avoid  anything  of  the  sort. 
Horripilation  arrests  the  imagination  and  disrupts 
your  work. 

Afterward,  in  sackcloth  and  ashes,  I  regretted  it, 
regretted  rather  that  if  the  telephone  was  one  too 
many  for  me,  I  had  not  sent  for  Peters,  dug  it  out  of 
him,  and  then  flown  up  the  Hudson  as  I  would  have 
flown  if  I  had  known.  But  I  did  not  know.  How  could 
I  ?  It  is  true,  I  had  an  intuition  that  a  screw  was  loose. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  55 

Bradish's  message  was  queer.  Why  should  he  want 
me  to  be  at  the  manor  at  noon? 

In  an  effort  to  solve  the  riddle,  I  thought  of  this, 
that  and  the  other,  of  everything  in  fact  except  that  he 
had  botched  the  whole  thing. 

In  view  of  what  occurred,  I  have  to  say  and  although 
I  hate  emphasis,  I  cannot  say  it  emphatically  enough, 
that  what  he  did,  he  did  innocently,  ignorantly,  hon 
estly,  without  knowledge  of  the  facts,  thinking  it  all 
for  the  best,  best  for  himself  I  admit,  but  best  also 
for  her,  poor  girl,  as,  in  the  inscrutable  wisdom  of  the 
powers  that  rule  our  lives,  perhaps  it  was. 

Meanwhile,  I  looked  up  a  time-table,  made  a  mental 
note  of  a  train  and  sat  back  among  matters  personal. 

The  Pilar-Morin  troupe  had  been  giving  pantomime 
and  while  I  hoped  they  might  rise  to  mine,  I  was  uncer 
tain  whether  to  dangle  it  before  them  personally  or 
have  the  dangling  done  by  an  agent.  Yet  as  either 
course  had  its  disadvantages,  I  postponed  any  imme 
diate  decision,  yawned  my  head  off,  lounged  out, 
lounged  in,  dined  with  two  polo  men  and  afterward 
read  all  the  evening  papers,  in  one  of  which  I  discov 
ered  that  the  Pilar-Morins  had  gone.  When  have  I 
loved  a  dear  gazelle  that  it  did  not  sicken,  yes,  and  die? 
It  was  too  much  and  I  went  home. 

The  next  morning  I  was  up  at  what  I  think  I  have 
seen  described  as  betimes.  In  spite  of  which,  or  per 
haps  precisely  on  that  account,  I  missed  the  train. 
It  may  seem  fantastic  to  say  it  now  and  yet  I  cannot  but 
believe  that,  if  I  had  not  missed  it,  what  afterward 
occurred  would  not  have  occurred  at  all. 

When,  ultimately,  a  village  trap  dropped  me  at  the 
manor,  Bradish  ran  out  and  cursed  me.  I  expected 


56  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

nothing  else.  Through  the  mysterious  laws  of  life  any 
kindness  is  repaid  in  pain. 

It  was  then  a  trifle  after  one  and  the  day  was  of  the 
Veronese  school,  a  day  made  of  light,  of  colour,  of 
cobalt,  apple-green  and  ochre.  In  the  air  was  the 
smell  of  lilacs.  Beyond  was  the  Hudson  and,  before 
me,  the  house,  ugly,  comfortable,  the  mortgaged  win 
dows  candid  and  open. 

In  the  days  of  the  landed  gentry,  in  the  days  of  big 
bugs,  bigwigs,  chariots,  postillions,  red  coats,  loud  oaths 
and  tenant-tilled  estates,  the  manor  had,  I  dare  say, 
been  as  good  as  the  rest  of  them,  superior  perhaps,  but 
on  that  Veronese  high  noon,  it  seemed  down  at  the 
heel,  as  such  places  do  seem  when  the  odour  of  gentry 
has  gone  and  that  of  the  bailiffs  has  come.  It  was  like 
some  of  the  places  in  England  where  the  draw 
bridge  has  crumbled  and  the  moat  is  choked.  More 
over,  originally  mile  after  mile  in  extent,  running  far 
up  from  the  river  and  reaching  nobly  to  the  north  and 
south,  time  and  creditors  had  dwindled  and  curtailed 
it.  Of  the  great  estate  that  had  been,  only  the  house 
and  the  immediate  grounds  survived,  only  these  and 
two  buildings,  one  of  wood,  the  other  of  stone ;  one  the 
family  stable,  the  other  the  family  vault. 

But  Bradish,  ceasing  to  revile  me,  was  talking,  hur 
riedly  enough,  about  matters  that  I  did  not  quite  grasp, 
but  mainly  that  they  were  just  sitting  down  to  it,  that 
owing  to  the  haste  of  it  all,  there  was  only  Mrs. 
Chilton,  Mrs.  Trefusis,  Austen,  the  clergyman  and 
the  bride. 

I  looked  at  him.     'The  bride?" 

"My  dear  chap,  I  am,  or  will  be — it  is  a  bit  awkward 
for  the  moment — but  I  shall  be  the  happiest  man  in 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  57 

the  world  and  I  owe  a  lot  of  it  to  you.  Now  come 
on  in.  You  are  too  late  to  act  for  me  at  the  wedding, 
as  I  hoped  you  would;  you  are  in  time,  though,  to  drink 
our  health." 

"But "     I  found  but  that. 

He  misunderstood  it.  "Bonheur  be  blowed.  It  is 
of  no  consequence  now  what  he  says  or  does.  She  is 
mine!" 

His  eyes  lifted.  His  face  had  cleared.  The  spider 
was  dead.  He  seemed  transfigured.  Never  had  I 
seen  him  like  that  before.  Never  did  I  see  him  like 
that  again.  It  was  his  one  moment  of  happiness. 
Already  the  door  was  closing  on  him.  He  was  at  the 
threshold  of  the  Eblian  halls. 

At  the  time  I  knew  nothing  of  that  door,  nothing  of 
those  halls.  I  knew  only  that  Peters  had  botched  it, 
that  Bradish  was  unaware  that  Bonheur  had  been 
squelched,  and  a  sudden  picture  surged — Mrs.  Chilton 
telling  her  daughter  the  pretty  tale  of  a  blackmailer, 
leaving  it  to  her  darling  to  decide  whether  she  would 
suffer  her  mother  to  be  jailed,  pointing  to  Bradish  as 
their  saviour,  constraining  her  to  accept  him  and  I  felt 
for  the  poor  devil  a  pity  that  was  infinite.  For  when 
that  girl  knew,  as  she  would  know,  as  everything  is 
known,  nothing  could  convince  her  that  he  had  not  been 
a  party  to  it.  Never  for  a  second  would  she  believe 
that  she  had  not  first  been  rooked  and  then  bought 
and  sold. 

Rather  idle  to  tell  him  that  then.  Rather  idle  to  mar 
with  now  superfluous  information,  a  day  not  merely 
perfect  but  which  to  him  was  ideal.  I  could  do  nothing 
except  what  I  did  do.  I  followed  him  in. 

I  had  seen  Nelly  Chilton — Mrs.  James  Bradish  as 


58  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

she  then  was — but  twice.  On  each  occasion  her  beauty 
had  been  incredible.  Where  was  it  then?  She  was 
standing  behind  a  table.  Beside  her  was  Austen. 
Nearby,  Mrs.  Chilton  was  directing  a  waiter.  In  a 
window,  a  clergyman  was  talking  to  Mrs.  Trefusis. 
Through  another  window,  I  could  see  Mike.  From 
the  walls,  Chiltons  with  vermillion  coats  and  lace 
jabots,  others  with  powdered  hair  and  pointed  bodices, 
looked  on.  In  the  air  was  a  scent  of  lilacs. 

The  table  was  spread.  There  were  dishes,  wines, 
flowers,  all  of  which,  the  waiter  included,  must  have 
come  from  Fifth  Avenue,  ordered  by  Bradish,  charged 
to  his  account. 

These  details,  unimportant  in  themselves,  con 
tributed  to  the  atmosphere  of  this  room  that  was 
stirred  by  that  girl's  vibrations.  The  clergyman  held 
his  head  a  trifle  to  one  side,  as  though  appreciating 
something  said  by  Mrs.  Trefusis,  who  was  quite  inca 
pable  of  saying  anything  appreciable,  and  who  was 
looking,  not  at  him,  but  at  the  others,  at  Mrs.  Chilton, 
painted  and  flushed;  at  Austen,  black  from  the  black 
tumult  within  him,  and  at  that  girl. 

Hatted,  dressed  in  a  costume  of  light  cloth  that  was 
dark,  what  had  been  done  to  her?  Paphos  had  crum 
bled,  Venus  had  gone.  Instead  was  Hades  and  Pros 
erpine  drawn  into  it.  Exquisite  still,  as  Proserpine 
must  have  been,  she  had  lost  her  flagrant  beauty. 
White  as  a  sheet,  her  lips  quivered.  There  were  no 
tears  in  her  eyes.  In  their  purple  pools  there  was 
worse,  a  look  that  those  have  who  are  haunted. 

Austen  was  speaking  to  her.  She  did  not  reply. 
She  was  gazing  straight  ahead,  at  what?  I  cannot  say. 
At  things  visible  only  to  herself  perhaps,  but,  more 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  59 

probably,  I  think  she  was  meditating  ways  and  means 
of  escape,  which  even  as  they  fluttered  before  her,  she 
must  have  known  were  absurd.  Her  spirit  may  have 
been  brave.  The  pale  camisole  of  what  is  correct,  the 
straitjacket  of  conventionality,  strapped  her.  None 
the  less,  I  think  that  given  one  of  the  sudden  tempests 
that  the  Hudson  knows  and  from  which,  in  a  second, 
night  is  flung,  given  that  and  I  believe  she  would  have 
taken  Austen  and  bolted.  It  was  more  the  vivid  day 
than  the  pale  camisole  that  restrained  her. 

These  impressions,  however  long  in  the  telling,  were 
close  packed  in  a  moment's  space.  They  flooded  me 
as  I  entered.  A  moment  more  and  the  atmosphere 
cleared.  Mrs.  Chilton  smiled,  Austen  turned,  the 
bride  lowered  her  eyes,  the  clergyman  abandoned  the 
window,  Mrs.  Trefusis  approached,  the  waiter  ad 
vanced  and,  to  the  latter's  patent  astonishment,  over 
the  table,  with  head  bowed,  the  clergyman  said  grace. 

A  cork  popped.  I  found  myself  eating  foie  gras, 
an  abominable  dish,  which  reminded  me  of  duties 
already  sufficiently  shirked  and  rising,  glass  in  hand,  I 
proposed  the  health  of  the  happy  couple. 

The  clergyman  took  it  up.  I  like  clergymen,  when 
they  are  likeable,  and  Dr.  Renwick,  God  bless  him,  was 
a  likeable  man,  in  fine  form,  and  between  us  we  man 
aged  to  keep  it  going,  managed  to  evoke  at  least  the 
ghost  of  gaiety  that  every  wedding  feast  demands. 

But  the  whole  thing  was  ghastly.  That  girl  neither 
ate,  nor  drank,  nor  spoke.  Ramrodded  in  her  chair 
she  looked  at  Austen,  who  looked  at  her,  as  she  looked 
at  him,  with  eyes  that  were  tragic.  But  while  her  face, 
to  which  the  rare  and  riant e  beauty  seemed  then  to 


60  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

have  said  farewell,  was  white  and  tense,  his  face  was 
black  and  violent. 

It  was  poignant.  An  old  air,  quaint  and  sugared, 
an  aria  from  the  Somnambula,  the  O  perche  non  posso 
odiarte,  beat  time  in  my  head.  It  was  precisely  as 
though  they  were  joining  in,  wondering  why,  in  so 
much  love,  hate  could  not  enter. 

With  that  surety  that  breeding  is,  Bradish  appeared 
unconscious  of  it.  The  spider  had  leaped  into  life 
again,  but  any  venom  it  may  have  been  distilling  he 
splendidly  concealed,  rattling  on  at  Mrs.  Chilton,  turn 
ing  from  her  to  the  clergyman,  from  him  to  Mrs. 
Trefusis,  and  back  again  to  his  sudden  mother-in-law. 

That  woman,  with  her  painted  face  and  air  of 
intolerable  secrets,  had  a  look  frightened  and  relieved. 
The  fright  was  retrospective.  It  had  gone.  But 
fright,  even  in  going,  leaves  its  mark.  The  mark  was 
on  her,  yet  mitigated  by  an  immense  relief.  Every 
body  was  dished.  Croesus  was  her  son-in-law.  None 
the  less,  beneath  her  summoned  smiles,  perhaps  she 
shuddered.  Yet  with  the  same  surety  that  Bradish 
displayed,  she  talked  and  laughed,  turning  now  to  Mrs. 
Trefusis,  again  to  her  daughter,  turning  away,  forced 
to  seem  as  unconscious  of  her  as  Bradish  appeared. 

'Foie  gras  is  fit  only  for  the  cultivated  taste  of  a 
drayman.  Supreme  de  poulet  Regence  is  a  mockery  to 
a  hungry  man.  At  high  noon  champagne  turns  one's 
stomach.  I  would  have  given  a  dollar,  two  dollars, 
five,  for  a  cut  of  beef,  a  baked  potato,  a  mug  of  ale. 
In  that  extravagant  mood,  ardently  I  wished  myself 
elsewhere.  The  breakfast  apart,  it  was  distressing 
to  look  at  the  bride.  It  seemed  to  me  painful  to  stare 
at  Proserpine  descending  into  Hades,  though,  could  I 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  61 

have  foreseen  the  deeper  depths  in  which  she  was  to 
pass,  instead  of  staring,  I  would  have  screamed. 

Then,  to  my  relief,  Bradish  said  something  to  Mrs. 
Chilton.  She  stood  up.  We  all  stood  up,  except  the 
waiter,  who  was  already  standing.  In  spite  of  the 
odour  of  food  and  wine,  faintly  the  scent  of  lilacs 
lingered.  Through^  a  window,  from  which  I  had  pre 
viously  seen  Mike,  I  saw  him  again,  grooming  a  car 
in  which  were  bags  and  a  hatbox.  From  the  window  I 
looked  at  the  bride.  She  was  talking  then,  talking 
inaudibly  to  Austen,  saying  perhaps  the  tender  things 
that  hurt  and  hurt,  the  words  that  bring  tears  swiftest. 
From  them,  I  looked  at  Bradish. 

"Jirri,"  I  called,  and  as  I  spoke  I  went  over  and  took 
his  hand,  "I  don't  know  where  you  are  bound,  but 
wherever  it  may  be,  my  best  wishes,  all  of  them,  every 
one,  go  with  you." 

He  did  not  reply.  He  just  nodded  and  shook  my 
hand.  He  was,  I  realised,  strung  up  to  the  breaking 
point  of  human  emotion.  But  he  did  not  betray  it. 
It  was  the  spider  that  did.  Glowing  with  a  crimson 
and  baleful  life  of  its  own,  I  could  almost  see  the 
antennae  contract. 

uGod  bless  you,"  I  told  him.  uThe  things  I  leave 
unsaid  to  your  wife,  say  to  her  for  me." 

Still  he  said  nothing.  He  nodded  as  before  and 
shook  my  hand  with  a  grasp  that  was  mighty. 

Why  did  I  not  hold  on  to  him  as  mightily?  Why  did 
I  leave  him  for  what  he  was  going  on  to  meet?  It  was 
there.  It  was  just  beyond.  It  was  at  the  turn  of  the 
road.  Eyes  clearer  than  mine  could  have  seen  it. 
Hands  firmer  than  mine  would  have  held  him.  A  voice 


62  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

more  gifte'd  would  have  told  him  not  to  leave  that 
room. 

In  looking  back  at  it  now,  when  it  is  all  over  and 
done  for,  it  seems  to  me,  as  it  must  seem  to  many 
another,  that  when  we  are  a  bit  more  evolved,  we  will 
look  ahead  as  readily  as  we  now  look  back;  that  the 
immediate  future  will  be  as  clear  as  the  immediate 
past.  Or,  more  correctly  perhaps,  we  will  realise  that 
there  is  no  future,  no  past,  merely  a  continuous  present 
in  which  events  occur.  Those  events  we  will  see,  as  the 
traveller  on  a  highway  sees  meadows  or  bogs,  abysses 
or  peaks,  friends  or  foes,  or,  perhaps,  merely  court 
yards  curtained  with  cashmeres  where  chimeras  and 
hippogriffs  crouch.  Consciously  he  goes  on  to  meet 
them  or,  as  consciously,  turns  away. 

All  that,  and  stupid  enough  it  is,  and,  by  the  same 
token,  sufficiently  unconsolatory,  came  to  me  later. 
Meanwhile,  I  must  have  taken  some  sort  of  conge.  I 
say  I  must  have  because,  while  I  would  have  taken 
French  leave,  as  they  call  it  in  England,  and  English 
leave,  as  they  call  it  in  France,  some  forms  I  did 
observe.  But  I  remember  nothing  about  it.  All  I 
do  recall  is  a  diligent  smile  that  I  got  from  Mrs. 
Chilton  and  a  look,  absolutely  haunted,  that  came  to 
me  from  that  girl.  That  look,  from  that  girl,  who 
was  barely  a  bride,  accompanied  me  to  the  village 
where  I  went  with  the  clergyman  and  with  the  waiter 
tagging  behind. 

I  did  not  then  know  the  clergyman's  name.  A  few 
moments  later  I  learned  that  it  was  Renwick,  a  good 
name  as  he,  I  am  sure,  was  a  good  man. 

On  the  way  down,  a  car  shot  by.  In  it  was  Mrs. 
Trefusis.  A  car  followed,  a  car  long,  narrow,  grey, 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  63 

one  which  I  had  already  seen  at  the  manor.  In  it  I 
had  a  glimpse  of  Austen,  flying  on,  ignoring  us,  lost 
to  everything,  lost  in  the  black  tumult  of  his  soul. 

Meanwhile  the  clergyman  had  been  quoting  Thomas 
a  Kempis.  Interested  in  what  he  was  saying,  I  forgot 
the  haunted  eyes.  By  this  time  we  had  reached  the 
village  and,  as  he  was  reciting  a  passage,  it  came,  a 
bolt,  as  the  phrase  is,  from  the  blue. 

Mentally,  it  took  me  a  moment  to  adjust  myself. 
Meanwhile,  I  was  staring  at  the  man  who  had  precipi 
tated  it.  Seated  in  a  waggon  he  was  yelling  at  the 
clergyman,  calling  him  by  name,  which  I  then  learned 
was  Renwick.  It  was  not  hot  on  that  Veronese  day, 
yet  he  was  perspiring,  yelling  and  wiping  his  face  at 
the  same  time,  urging  Dr.  Renwick  to  get  in  and: 
"You,  too,  young  feller,  if  you  know  'em." 

He  spat  and  shouted.  "It  was  up  yonder.  They're 
all  dead,  all  three  of  'em.  I'm  headed  for  Dr.  Curtis. 
But  there's  room  for  all.  Get  in." 

In  his  cultivated  voice,  I  heard  Dr.  Renwick  say: 
"Mr.  Belcher,  I  am  sorry.  I  have  not  understood  what 
you  were  telling  me.  Who  is  dead?" 

Again  the  Comanche  shouted:  "Miss  Chilton  and 
two  men." 

We  all  know  we  are  to  die  and  few  of  us  believe  it, 
and  naturally  perhaps,  since  there  is  no  such  thing  as 
death.  But  death,  even  in  its  literal  meaning,  lacked 
coherence  then.  I  could  not  believe  it.  My  mind  had 
not  yet  adjusted  itself  to  what  my  ears  had  heard.  But 
I  was  aware  that  Dr.  Renwick  was  hurriedly  question 
ing  and  I  was  aware,  too,  of  hurried  and  shouted 
replies.  I  was  aware  also  of  a  gathering  group,  sprung 
from  nowhere,  from  a  saloon  opposite,  from  the  side- 


64  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

walk,  from  a  grocery  nearby,  from  the  station  beyond, 
from  the  sky;  a  group  that  had  dropped  or  arisen 
about  us  and  it  was  dully,  from  sounds  that  seemed 
to  proceed  from  afar  that  I  absorbed  and  reassembled 
the  purport  of  it  all  and  of  which  the  substance  was 
that  Bradish's  car,  flung  out  like  a  meteor,  had  thrown 
a  wheel,  reared,  reversed,  turned  over  and  that  those 
within  were  dead. 

Then  at  once,  from  the  momentary  and  mental 
swoon,  I  swam  up  and  I  thought,  what  does  this  Yahoo 
know  about  it?  They  may  not  be  dead;  knocked  out 
perhaps,  perhaps  unconscious,  but  not  dead. 

Even  then  I  denied  myself  the  truth.  That  was 
sheer  primitiveness,  the  instinct  of  self-preservation, 
for  truth,  some  truths  at  least,  can  drive  one  mad. 

VIII 

WHEN  I  reached  the  manor,  they  were  there.  Any 
thing  being  preferable  to  the  yelling  Yahoo,  it  had 
been  a  relief  to  see  him  take  Dr.  Renwick  and  go.  Of 
the  relief  that  they  were  in  search,  I  had  my  doubts 
and  also  my  certainties.  A  country  practitioner,  what 
could  he  do  ?  At  once  Cally  and  his  wizardries  hopped 
in  my  mind. 

Already  the  door,  the  enigmatic  door,  was  closing. 
I  did  not  know  that.  I  knew  of  no  door.  Yet,  as  I 
later  discovered,  in  that  door  I  turned  the  key. 

Meanwhile,  entering  the  station,  I  wrote  a  telegram 
to  Cally  which  I  incorrectly  addressed.  Since  then  I 
have  often  wondered  what  might  have  occurred  if  I 
had  addressed  it  correctly.  But  as  often  I  have  con 
cluded  that  Cally  was  prevented  from  receiving  the 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  65 

telegram  not,  primarily,  because  of  an  error  of  mine, 
but  because  it  was  not  intended  that  it  should  reach 
him.  The  progressions  of  life  and  of  death  it  is  not 
for  mortals  to  alter.  When  they  do  alter  them,  or 
appear  to,  what  is  done  was  in  accordance  with  higher 
designs.  That  is  the  occult  view  to  which  sometimes, 
though  not  always,  I  adhere. 

The  wire  itself,  it  took  me  quite  a  little  while  to  send, 
the  operator  happening  to  be  refreshing  himself  else 
where.  It  was  therefore  some  time  after  the  Co- 
manche  had  gone  that  I  reached  the  manor,  and,  as  I 
have  said,  when  I  did  reach  it,  they  were  there. 

The  door  of  the  house  was  open.  Open  and  empty 
too  was  the  hall.  In  the  room  where  we  had  break 
fasted  there  were  but  the  brave  and  bodiced  Chiltons 
looking  on  from  their  frames  on  the  walls,  only  these, 
half  emptied  bottles,  dishes  unremoved,  the  remains  of 
a  wedding  feast  at  which  Death,  too,  had  looked  on. 

As  I  entered  the  hall,  I  heard  voices  that  came  from 
the  floor  above.  There,  in  a  room  hung  with  faded 
chintz,  furnished  with  rickety  Sheratons,  on  a  satin- 
wood  fourposter,  lay  that  girl.  Over  her  a  little  man 
bent.  He  was  shaking  his  head.  It  seemed  very 
empty.  But  the  motion  distracted  me.  I  looked  at 
the  others,  at  Mrs.  Chilton,  at  a  woman  I  had  never 
seen,  and  at  Dr.  Renwick  who,  holding  a  book  from 
which  he  must  have  read  the  marriage  service,  was 
concluding  some  prayer. 

"Heart  failure  superinduced  by  shock,"  the  little 
man  by  way  of  Amen  pronounced  and  I  looked  again 
at  that  girl. 

Her  eyes,  that  had  seemed  so  haunted,  then  were 
closed  and  her  face,  that  had  been  so  drawn  and  tense, 


66  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

had  recovered  its  former  beauty.  It  was  as  though 
death  in  taking  her  life  had  given  back  her  loveliness. 
The  jewels,  which  imaginatively  I  had  strung  about 
her  and  which  she  had  never  needed,  had  gone,  as  the 
haunted  look  had  gone.  In  their  stead  was  peace,  the 
peace  that  is  perhaps  beyond  all  knowledge,  yet 
attenuated,  I  thought,  by  just  the  quiver  of  a  passing 
smile,  a  smile  that  just  showed  itself  and  went.  The 
effect,  highly  curious,  was  as  though  her  riante  charm 
had  made  an  effort  to  return  and  death  had  pulled 
it  back. 

"Yes,"  Death  seemed  to  say,  uin  my  arms  you  may 
be  lovely,  but  smiles  I  cannot  brook." 

That,  too,  was  imagination.  I  saw  it  was.  In  the 
upturned  commas  of  her  perfect  mouth  there  was  no 
suggestion  of  any  smile  at  all.  Death  had  kissed  her 
smiles  away;  kissed  from  her  despair,  happiness,  sor 
row,  kissed  her  into  peace. 

"So  far  as  I  can  determine,"  the  little  man  was  say 
ing,  "not  a  single  lesion.  Just  the  heart." 

"And  Bradish?"  I  asked  and  checked  myself,  for 
the  girl's  mother  was  sobbing. 

It  was  her  fault.  At  that  moment  she  knew  it.  At 
that  moment  she  knew  what  the  Halls  of  Eblis  are,  the 
horrible  halls  of  the  horrible  hell  into  which  the  foster 
sisters,  Regret  and  Remorse,  can  fling  you. 

A  hand  covered  her  eyes,  from  which  tears,  possibly 
scorching,  certainly  unredeeming,  ran  down  into  the 
paint  beneath.  What  could  I  do?  What  could  any 
one  do?  A  poet  said  he  could  sympathise  with  any 
thing  except  suffering.  I  had  no  sympathy  for  hers, 
but  apparently  Dr.  Renwick  felt  differently. 

"My  dear  Mrs.  Chilton!    My  dear  Mrs.  Chilton!" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  67 

he  was  remonstrating.  "Sorrow  is  sent  to  make  us 
nobler  than  we  were." 

You  are  entirely  right,  I  thought.  But  you  miss  the 
point.  Sorrow  afflicts  the  spirit  that  is  freed,  par 
ticularly  when  the  spirit  is  probably  present,  probably 
in  this  very  room.  A  line  of  de  Vere's  recurred  to  me : 
"Grief  should  be  like  joy,  equable,  sedate." 

But  more  effective  perhaps  than  the  clergyman's 
ministrations,  was  the  ingrained  sentiment  of  form. 
Mrs.  Chilton  choked  back  her  sobs  and  when  her  hand 
fell,  as  it  immediately  did  fall,  she  displayed  a  visage 
blotched  certainly  (for  water  and  paint  do  not  marry 
very  well),  but  assured.  To  have  achieved  that  so 
promptly  did  not  show  callousness.  One  is  never  cal 
lous  about  oneself.  But  it  constituted  one  of  the  minor 
triumphs  of  civilised  life. 

She  turned  to  me.  "Dr.  Curtis  says  Mr.  Bradish 
will  recover.  Will  you  come  where  he  is?" 

On  the  way,  the  little  man  buttonholed  me. 

"I  did  not  say  that.  I  said  he  might  recover.  A 
man  of  means,  I  understand.  I'll  telephone  for  a 


nurse." 


"For  a  dozen,"  I  told  him. 

In  a  room,  practically  a  duplicate  of  the  other  except 
for  the  furniture  which  was  Chippendale,  Bradish  lay 
on  another  colonial  fourposter.  Unconscious  as  he  was, 
he  did  not  know,  and  might  never  know,  what  had 
happened.  Already  his  clothes  had  been  removed; 
already,  too,  he  had  been  examined.  "A  broken  collar 
bone,"  the  little  man  announced,  and  that  I  knew  was 
nothing.  "A  broken  ankle,"  he  continued,  and  that  I 
knew  was  less.  But,  to  these,  he  added  an  occipital 
fracture  and  I  thanked  God  I  had  wired  for  Cally. 


68  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

The  next  visit  was  to  poor  Mike  who,  like  that  girl, 
was  dead;  though,  unlike  her,  his  neck  was  broken. 

Mrs.  Chilton,  meanwhile,  had  disappeared  and  I 
went  down  to  the  hall,  where  I  found  Dr.  Renwick. 
He  was  just  leaving.  The  funeral,  he  said,  was  to  be 
at  noon,  in  forty-eight  hours,  and,  since  I  was  return 
ing  to  town,  would  I  insert  the  usual  notices  and  add, 
it  was  Mrs.  Chilton's  wish,  he  explained,  that  the 
funeral  was  private. 

"Yes,"  I  told  him,  "but  there  is  a  lot  else:  Bradish 
cannot  be  moved.  He  will  have  to  have  nurses.  The 
nurses  will  have  to  be  fed.  I  know  nothing  of  the 
domestic  arrangements  here  but,  apparently,  they  are 
not  profuse.  If  Mrs.  Chilton  does  not  object,  and  I 
hope  she  will  not,  I  shall  send  some  of  his  servants." 

Vaguely  he  motioned.  "Pray  do  so,  Mrs.  Chilton 
was  to  have  gone  from  here  today.  Now  she  will 
go  immediately  after  the  funeral  of  that  poor  child, 
whom  I  loved  like  a  daughter." 

"Where  is  her  father?"  I  asked. 

He  raised  his  eyes,  shook  his  head.  I  saw  that  he 
did  not  know,  saw  too  that  the  question  distressed  him. 

I  put  on  my  hat.    "May  I  accompany  you?" 

Courteously  he  consented  and,  as  we  went  down  the 
road,  which  twice  that  day  I  had  ascended  and  on 
which  on  each  occasion,  the  Daughters  of  Hazard,  of 
whom  ^Eschylus  tells,  had  lain  in  wait,  he  stopped  and 
gave  me  his  hand.  He  was  going,  he  said,  to  the 
undertaker. 

"An  undertaker  here!  In  this  little  place!"  I 
exclaimed. 

"Death  visits  the  hamlet  as  well  as  the  metropolis," 
he  replied. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  69 

A  cross-road  took  him  and  I  went  on  to  the  station 
alone,  more  alone,  I  think,  than  I  had  ever  been  before. 
I  could  not  comfortably  contemplate  a  future  from 
which  Bradish  was  eliminated  and,  if  he  recovered,  if 
he  did,  I  felt  that  it  would  be  harder  still  for  him  to 
reconcile  himself  to  the  long  rain  of  days  from  which 
she  had  gone.  To  have  got  her  partook  of  the  mar 
vellous,  but  to  have  got  her  one  moment  and  to  have 
lost  her  the  next,  might  become  to  him  a  retrospective 
torture  that  would  inhabit  his  thoughts  until  the  accus 
toming  hands  of  time  calmed  him  and  lulled  him  and 
let  him  forget. 

So  I  thought.  I  thought  it  would  pass  as  all  things 
pass.  Yes,  I  thought  that.  I  could  not  foresee  that 
there  was  to  be  no  forgetfulness,  nothing  but  the 
fidelity  of  torture  that  was  to  take  him  and  play  on 
him  and  strike  from  him  every  note  in  the  whole  gamut 
of  pain. 

IX 

ANOTHER  day  after  Veronese. 

As  the  train  flung  itself  along  the  river,  I  told  myself 
I  had  done 'all  I  could.  To  the  surprise  of  a  clerk  in 
a  cage,  I  had  shoved  at  him  a  marriage  notice  and  a 
death  notice  of  even  date,  both  concerning  the  same 
person.  He  did  not  like  it  and  who  would?  I  had  to 
establish  my  identity  before  he  would  accept  them. 
Meanwhile  I  had  shipped  to  the  manor  whatever  an 
unconscious  man  needs  the  least.  I  had  gone  to  the 
great  white  staring  house  and  sent  Peters  with  the  chef 
and  two  other  servants  to  the  station.  I  had  gone  to 
Mike's  widow.  I  had  done  other  things  which  I  have 


70  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

since  forgotten.  I  had  done  all  I  could.  But  in  the 
train  that  was  taking  me  to  the  funeral,  I  had  a  sense 
of  subconscious  discomfort,  the  sense  of  some  para 
mount  thing  overlooked.  Then,  just  before  the  train 
was  stopping,  out  it  hopped. 

Cally! 

In  the  hurry  of  all  I  had  had  to  do,  I  had  neglected 
to  go  to  his  office.  But,  I  consolingly  reflected,  what 
did  it  matter? 

That  it  did  matter,  and  monumentally,  I  was  not  to 
learn  until  later  and  yet  why,  at  the  time,  it  should 
have  pricked  me,  I  doubt  if  Freud  could  have  told. 

What  did  it  matter?  I  reflected.  I  had  not  been 
to  his  office  and  would  not  have  found  him  if  I  had,  for 
he  must  have  gone  to  the  manor,  where  probably  he 
had  remained.  The  idea  that  my  telegram  was  an 
estray  never  entered  my  head. 

In  the  train  were  small  detachments  of  silent  and 
sombre  people,  relatives  I  fancied,  and  I  was  convinced 
of  it  when  they  all  got  out  at  the  station,  where  con 
veyances  for  them  which  the  undertaker  must  have 
seen  to  and  supplied,  yet  perhaps  inadequately;  in  any 
event  there  was  none  for  me,  unless  I  intruded  on 
mourners  whom  I  did  not  know,  and  while  capable  of 
a  good  deal,  but  not  of  that,  I  started  off  on  foot, 
disconsolately  noting  that  the  day  of  the  wedding  and 
the  day  of  the  funeral  were  twins.  There  were  the 
same  colours,  the  same  myrrh  and  cassia  in  the  air 
that  was  not  of  spring  or  of  summer  but  of  both,  a 
season  not  for  death  but  for  life,  a  time  to  love  love, 
not  to  bury  it. 

"Will  you  get  in?"  someone  was  saying. 

I  had  heard  a  car,  but  I  had  not  looked.     Then  I 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  71 

did  look.  It  was  the  long,  grey  car  I  had  seen  after 
the  wedding  and  in  which  had  been  Austen  hurrying 
on  in  that  effort  which  is  the  most  desperate  of  all,  the 
attempt  to  escape  from  oneself.  He  was  in  the  car 
then  and,  as  I  looked,  I  thought  his  face  blacker  even 
than  before,  a  face  that  expressed  not  the  sorrow  that 
he  must  have  felt,  but  rebellion  at  life,  at  death,  at  all 
there  is,  at  all  there  shall  be;  the  face  of  a  soul  in  hell. 

"Will  you  get  in?"  he  repeated  and,  when  I  did,  he 
asked  about  Bradish. 

I  told  him  what  I  could.  He  asked  nothing  else. 
He  said  nothing  more.  I  fancied  that  he  knew  as 
much  as  I  did. 

In  the  papers  of  the  day  before  there  had  been  ac 
counts  headlined,  featured,  graphic,  inexact.  The 
tragic  wedding  of  the  last  of  the  Chiltons  to  the  play 
mate  of  her  childhood.  The  beauty  of  the  bride.  The 
wealth  of  the  bridegroom.  The  death  of  the  one.  The 
mortal  injuries  of  the  other.  The  manor.  Colonial 
New  York.  The  mourning  of  what  was  termed  the 
four  hundred. 

These  accounts  Austen  had  certainly  seen  and  I 
wondered  whether  he  had  already  run  up  to  the  village. 
I  did  not  ask,  nor  did  I  ever  learn  that  he  had,  though 
afterward,  from  circumstances  that  developed,  I  real 
ised  that  he  must  have.  At  the  time  however,  during 
the  brief  drive,  he  said  nothing  more,  nor  did  I  hear 
him  utter  another  syllable.  Yet  then,  one  does  not  go 
to  a  funeral  to  talk  and  necessarily  this  was  more  than 
a  funeral  to  him,  much  more,  though  how  I  arrived  at 
that  extravagant  conjecture  is  beyond  me  even  now. 

The  brief  procession  from  the  train  had  entered  the 
house  when  we  reached  it  and  together  we  passed  on 


72  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

and  in  to  the  room  of  the  candid  and  mortgaged  win 
dows,  through  which  a  breath  of  lilacs  came. 

Into  that  breath  there  filtered  the  subtler  fragrance 
of  lilies  that  banked  an  open  coffin  in  which  the  dead 
girl  lay.  Behind  the  coffin,  his  back  to  the  wall,  from 
which  the  brave  and  bodiced  Chiltons  looked,  was  Dr. 
Renwick.  Before  the  coffin  were  the  mourners,  among 
whom  I  had  a  glimpse  of  a  man  who,  though  he  stood 
with  bowed  head,  had  an  air  of  extreme  distinction. 
I  had  a  glimpse  also  of  a  stricken  woman. 

Rouge  is  not  mourning.  Her  face  was  unpainted. 
But  that  air  of  ease,  of  potential  arrogance,  of  intol 
erable  secrets,  the  impression  wholly  atmospheric 
which  previously  Mrs.  Chilton  had  suggested,  the  im 
pression  of  a  soul  at  bay,  that  had  gone.  She  looked 
what  she  was,  a  woman  conscious  that  the  blow  that 
had  struck  her  her  own  hand  had  dealt. 

Unobtrusively  I  hope,  in  any  event  as  quietly  as  I 
could,  I  edged  nearer  to  where  the  dead  girl  lay.  Forty- 
eight  hours  earlier  I  had  seen  that  Death  in  kissing  her 
had  brought  her  beauty  back,  heightening  it  even,  ren 
dering  it  calm,  unaware  of  emotion  as  true  beauty  ever 
is,  divesting  it  of  anguish,  divesting  it,  too,  of  joy.  In 
Death's  arms  she  had  been  at  peace. 

But  at  this  time,  as,  in  edging  nearer  the  coffin,  I 
saw  her  again,  her  expression  seemed  to  have  changed. 
Her  lips  half-parted  showed  the  nacre  of  her  teeth  and 
in  and  about  them,  in  and  about  the  downcast  eyes, 
there  was  a  look  different  from  that  which  Death  had 
brought,  different  also  from  that  which  Death  had 
kissed  away.  In  those  days  I  was  less  familiar  with 
the  phenomena  of  death  than  I  have  since  become.  I 
knew  then  that  those  whom  the  gods  love  die  young.  I 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  73 

did  not  know  that  the  gods  in  sending  death  to  those 
they  love  send  with  it  some  vision  of  the  supernal. 
It  was  there.  In  those  upturned  lips  and  downcast 
eyes  there  was  wonder. 

"I  am  the  Resurrection  and  the  Life!" 

The  sonorous  and  exalting  words,  the  most  exalting 
that  I  know,  shook  me.  From  the  dead,  I  looked  at 
the  living.  I  looked  at  the  clergyman,  at  the  mourners, 
at  the  lover. 

Death,  the  death  rather  and  the  sight  of  it,  may 
have  wrought  its  miracles  on  him.  In  his  car,  on  the 
way  to  the  house,  he  had  looked  defiant,  rebellious,  a 
soul  at  odds  with  God  and  man.  But  now,  in  some 
way,  through  some  special  grace,  through  one  of  the 
miracles  that  Death  achieves,  peace  had,  or  appeared 
to  have,  descended  upon  him.  What  his  face  displayed 
was  not  resignation,  which  may  be,  and  often  is,  but  a 
form  of  mental  suicide,  but  relief,  the  relief  that  comes 
when  hope,  fear,  uncertainty,  all  the  vultures  of  the 
mind,  have  fled,  when  the  worst  that  can  be  has  been 
done. 

At  the  time,  it  was  in  that  manner  that  I  viewed 
it.  Afterward,  in  reassembling  impressions,  another 
explanation,  less  laboured  and  more  obvious  occurred 
to  me.  The  change  in  Austen,  if  change  there  really 
were,  I  attributed  to  the  simple  process  of  thanksgiv 
ing.  He  had  lost  the  girl  he  loved,  yet  the  loss  had 
been  strangely  mitigated.  An  unbearable  knowledge 
had  been  lifted  from  him.  He  could  not  have  her,  but 
neither  could  anyone  else.  She  had  been  taken,  but 
not  to  another's  arms.  What  he  had  lost,  no  one  had 
won. 

It  was  in  recognition  of  that,  I  thought,  that  the 


74  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

thanksgiving  had  come,  and  I  thought  also  that  the 
thanksgiving  was  very  human.  That  the  girl  of  girls 
shall  not  be  won,  murder  after  murder  has  been  com 
mitted.  That  too  is  human.  Human  and  tolerably 
primitive. 

Meanwhile,  the  service  had  ended.  A  stout  man, 
fussy  but  silent,  the  undertaker,  attended  to  the  coffin's 
removal  to  the  hall,  where  I  followed  and  where 
neatly,  swiftly,  almost  noiselessly,  he  closed  it. 

To  me,  it  was  like  a  kick  in  the  stomach.  I  looked 
away.  On  the  adjacent  stair  was  Peters.  Without 
speaking,  I  motioned.  The  motion,  I  knew,  sufficed. 
I  knew  he  would  know  that  presently  I  would  return. 
As  I  motioned,  I  thought  of  Cally.  Where  was  he? 

But  at  once  the  coffin's  journey  began  again  and  we 
all  went  on  and  out  to  the  grounds  and  the  vault,  a 
structure  roomy  and  chill,  where  perhaps  the  shades 
of  departed  Chiltons  greeted  the  spirit  of  their  kins 
woman  who,  forty-eight  hours  earlier,  during  that 
other  ceremony  had,  I  am  sure,  despairfully  wished 
for  the  peace  that  was  theirs,  had  wished  also  and  far 
more  desperately  that  Bradish  were  Austen. 

As  the  coffin  passed  into  the  crypt,  back  from  it 
came  the  odour  of  tuberoses,  the  scent  sweet  and  deadly 
of  wreaths  put  upon  it.  I  have  never  forgotten  it. 
Dr.  Renwick  was  then  reciting  the  last  words  of  the 
final  rites  and,  these  ended,  I  turned  back  to  the  house. 

In  the  hall  was  Peters. 

"How  is  he?"  I  asked. 

"The  nurse  says " 

"But  Dr.  Cally?    What  does  he  say?" 

"Dr.  Cally,  sir?  I  haven't  seen  him.  Dr. 
Curtis " 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  75 

"Do  you  mean  to  tell  me  Dr.  Cally  has  not  been 
here?" 

MNot  to  my  knowledge,  sir." 

It  was  inconceivable.  The  idea  that  I  had  botched 
the  address  never  occurred  to  me.  What  did  occur  to 
me  was  that  when  I  could  I  would  give  him  fits. 

The  opportunity  was  not  delayed.  Mephistophe- 
lianly,  in  the  open  doorway,  there  he  stood. 

I  sprang  at  him.  "What  the  devil!  Where  have 
you  been?  Why  haven't  you  come  before?" 

One  look,  a  look  bland  and  sarcastic,  was  all  he 
deigned  to  give  me  and  that  look  he  diverted  to 
Peters. 

"Upstairs?    Lead  the  way." 

"But  see  here,"  I  threw  in  and  started  to  follow. 

He  turned  to  me.    "You  stay  where  you  are." 

The  stair  took  him,  and  would  have  taken  me,  had 
not  philosophy,  an  old  friend  of  mine,  caught  me  by 
the  arm,  remarking  that  Cally  was  quite  right,  that  I 
would  be  only  in  the  way,  that  explanations  of  mine 
would  explain  nothing,  that  certainly  he  did  not  need  to 
be  told  what  certainly  I  did  not  know,  whereupon  in 
stead  of  damning,  I  blessed.  Thank  God,  he  was  there ! 

The  mourners,  meanwhile,  were  leaving.  Not  all, 
however.  Two  women  and  a  man  were  entering  the 
hall.  One  of  the  women  was  Mrs.  Chilton.  When  I 
saw  her  in  the  room  beyond,  probably  she  had  a  hat 
on.  I  had  not  noticed.  I  saw  it  then,  saw  too  that  she 
was  heavily  veiled.  I  had  moved  aside  and  as,  with 
the  other  woman,  she  passed  me,  she  made  some  slight 
inclination  of  the  head.  Then  up  the  stair  they  went.  I 
had  never  seen  the  other  woman  before  and  I  have 
never  seen  Mrs.  Chilton  since.  Afterward  I  learned 


76  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

that  that  afternoon  both  had  driven  away.  But  had  I 
known  that  that  was  to  be  my  last  meeting  with  Mrs. 
Chilton,  mentally  I  would  have  wished  her  well.  It 
is  very  pontifical  to  judge  anybody. 

Then,  immediately,  I  found  myself  judging  the  man 
who  had  come  in  with  them.  He  had  an  arid  air,  the 
dry,  self-sufficient  look  of  the  super-rich  and  a  mouth 
like  a  buttonhole.  Probably  a  banker,  I  thought: 
probably,  too,  the  husband  of  the  woman  who  had  just 
gone  up  the  stair.  I  did  not  envy  either  of  them  and 
suddenly  I  felt  very  hostile. 

He  was  there,  fiddling  with  his  hat,  affecting  to  re 
gard  me  as  part  of  the  furniture.  It  was  not  that  that 
angered  me.  What  angered  was  that  Mrs.  Chilton, 
instead  of  messing  things  with  that  blackmailer  of  a 
dressmaker,  could  not  have  gone  to  him  and  could  not 
go,  because,  while  manifestly  the  man  was  a  relative, 
she  knew  him  to  be  poor,  unwilling  to  aid.  For  it  is 
unwillingness  to  aid  that  constitutes  poverty,  and  that 
is  the  poverty,  not  of  the  poor,  but  of  the  rich. 

Then  at  once  the  idea  passed,  banished  by  another, 
the  possibility  that  the  painted  blackmailer  and  the 
painted  mother-in-law  were  in  league  together  and  I 
cursed  myself  that  I  had  not  thought  of  it  before.  Any 
jackass  could  have  seen  that  ordinarily  Bonheur  would 
never  have  gone  to  Bradish  with  the  cheque.  Ordi 
narily  he  would  have  put  it  through  his  bank.  And 
for  how  much  was  it  after  all?  Bradish  had  said  four 
thousand,  but  he  had  barely  glanced  at  it.  It  might 
have  been  forty  thousand  and  I  could  picture  Mrs. 
Chilton  waving  it  at  the  dressmaker,  staking  him  with 
it  in  return  for  services  that  would  enable  her  to  force 
her  daughter's  hand. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  77 

Momentarily,  the  picture  occupied  me.  Before  I 
could  elaborate  it,  there  was  Peters  on  the  stair. 

"Well?" 

"Dr.  Cally's  compliments,  sir,  and  if  you  are  to  wait, 
you  will  please  not  wait  for  him.  No,  sir,  Dr.  Cally 
is  to  be  here  for  some  time." 

"But  what  else  did  he  say?  What  did  he  say  about 
Mr.  Bradish?" 

"Nothing,  sir.  Nothing  to  me.  But  I  don't  think 
he  is  easy  in  his  mind  about  him,  sir." 

For  that  matter,  I  was  not  easy  in  my  mind,  either. 
Nor  had  I  been,  not  for  a  moment  since  the  Yahoo 
yelled.  Consequently  I  did  want  something  to  go  on 
and  I  said: 

"Look  here,  Peters.     You  say  I  want  to  see  him." 

"Yes,  sir,  I  will  hascertain.  But  he  has  the  door 
closed  and  he  said  he  wouldn't  let  anyone  in,  not  even 
Mr.  Bradish's  own  mother  if  she  came  here  from  the 
grave." 

Well,  that  at  least  was  definite  and  I  went  out  on  the 
grounds  where  for  a  moment  I  stood  and  looked  at  the 
vault. 

That  door,  too,  was  closed. 

X 

PEACE  is  never  the  bedfellow  of  the  anxious,  and 
anxious  I  was  the  next  day,  as  I  sat  in  my  own  work 
shop.  Far  more  so  than  three  years  before  when  I 
found  myself  dished.  A  man  may  lose  a  fortune  and 
recover  and  double  it.  He  cannot  replace  a  friend. 
At  the  time,  I  had  no  other  friend  than  Bradish.  The 
events  of  the  last  few  days  needed  talking  over. 


7 8  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

I  wanted  to  talk  them  over.  Few  can  be  conversa 
tional  alone.  But  with  whom?  That  also  came  to  me. 
In  the  course  of  the  evening  I  rang  at  Aly  Bolton's 
door. 

"Who  is  it?"  she  asked  from  within. 

I  told  her  and  she  opened. 

The  narrow  hall,  a  hall  identical  in  construction  with 
my  own,  was  hung  with  India  shawls  and  the  living- 
room,  though  also  identical  with  my  own,  appeared 
much  larger  and  so  appeared  because  the  centre  was 
uncluttered.  Moreover,  at  either  end  was  a  mirror. 
Then  also,  the  etagere,  the  chairs,  the  table,  placed 
back  against  the  walls,  were  none  of  them  in  the  way, 
while  on  the  walls  were  prints,  dark  and  old,  from 
which  the  walls  seemed  to  recede. 

I  used  to  think  that  a  man's  distinction  resided  in 
the  distinction  of  his  surroundings  and  though  I  think 
so  no  longer,  none  the  less  it  would  have  been  obvious 
to  anyone  not  courageously  vulgar  that  the  occupant 
of  the  little  flat  was  an  artistic  young  woman.  A  gifted 
young  woman,  too,  as  I  had  already  discovered. 

"I  have  felt  for  you,"  she  said  as  we  sat  at  that 
table.  "The  papers  told  me.  And  now  you  are 
troubled." 

"It  is  about  Bradish,"  I  replied.  uHe  and  I  are 
pals.  I  don't  know  whether  he  will  pull  through.  By 
the  way.  Occasionally  he  must  have  disturbed  you. 
He  used  to  come  here  and  raise  the  dead." 

She  exclaimed  at  it.  "I  thought  it  was  he!  I  saw 
him  once  at  your  door,  but  he  did  not  see  me.  He  was 
too  busy  trying  to  get  at  you.  I  liked  his  face.  It  is 
very  beautiful." 

Wonderingly  I  looked  at  her. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  79 

"Yes,  the  face  of  a  beautiful  nature." 

I  nodded.  "Yes,  he  has  that.  But  I  am  sure  you 
are  right  in  saying  he  did  not  see  you.  If  He  had  he 
would  have  stood  and  mused  and  afterward  told  me 
of  it." 

"No,  he  did  not  see  me." 

She  spoke  simply  as  the  complex  do  speak.  On  the 
table  between  us  was  a  service,  of  Danish  ware  I  think, 
and  she  asked  would  I  have  tea. 

She  got  up  to  prepare  it  and  again  I  looked  about. 
The  mirror  at  the  farther  end  of  the  room  was  framed 
in  lacquered  bamboo.  Adjacent  were  shelves  of 
polished  wood  on  which  were  books.  Facing  them  was 
the  piano.  It  was  all  very  ordinary.  It  was  the  at 
mosphere  that  charmed.  I  have  been  in  ornate  apart 
ments  where  the  vibrations  jarred;  in  opulent  homes 
where  they  were  so  malign  I  could  not  remain.  In  this 
two-by-four  flat  there  were  none  or,  if  there  were  any, 
they  were  restful.  It  was  an  atmosphere  in  which 
there  was  nothing  discordant;  not  the  atmosphere  of 
the  cloister  for  that  is  choked;  not  the  atmosphere  of 
bohemianism  for  that  is  pretentious.  It  was  the  at 
mosphere  that  is  created  only  by  those  whose  ways 
are  pleasant,  by  the  gentle  and  by  gentlefolk. 

Returning  with  the  samovar,  she  poured  me  a  cup. 
She  made  no  offer  of  cream,  of  sugar,  nor  yet  of  lemon. 
It  was  tea  she  gave  me,  just  tea,  as  tea  should  be 
drunk,  when  it  is  tea,  and  this  was  tea,  the  real  thing, 
tea  that  needed  only  a  honeysuckle  or  two  to  make  it 
celestial,  tea  of  a  variety  and  of  a  quality  that  could 
be  obtained  but  in  the  Chinese  quarter  and  there  at  one 
shop  only. 

I  knew  that  tea.     It  awed  me.     For  I  knew,  too, 


8o  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

what  it  cost  and,  vaguely,  I  wondered  where  she  got 
the  money. 

"That  night,"  she  was  saying.  "You  remember? 
You  talked  of  antique  sins.  Anxiety  was  one  of  them. 
I  think  you  need  not  sin  that  way.  I  may  be  in  error, 
but  I  think  your  friend  will  recover." 

It  was  easy  enough  to  say,  but  merely  because  it  was 
easy  she  seemed  hardly  the  one  to  say  it.  In  speaking, 
she  had  raised  a  cup  and  I  had  been  looking  at  her. 
She  wore  a  blouse  embroidered  in  the  Rumanian  man 
ner.  As  always,  her  expression  was  noble  and  re 
served.  Nelly  Chilton  had  been  sent  out  as  perhaps 
only  a  blackmailing  faiseur  can  send  out  a  young 
woman.  Apart  from  that,  apart  too  from  her  riante 
look,  apart  also  from  her  Mayfair  intonation,  in  fea 
ture,  in  colouring,  there  she  sat. 

"It  is  startling,"  I  told  her. 

That  time  she  missed  it.     "But  I  may  be  wrong." 

I  shook  my  head.    "It  is  the  resemblance." 

The  cup  which  she  still  held  she  put  down.  "From 
what  I  read  about  her  it  was  instantaneous.  That  is 
terrible.  It  would  have  been  so  inexpressibly  better 
for  her  if  she  could  have  lingered  a  little  and  realised 
that  she  must  die." 

I  took  it  up.  "  'From  battle,  murder  and  sudden 
death,  Good  Lord,  deliver  us/  ' 

"Yes,  and  how  profound  that  is.  The  shock  of  sud 
den  death  confuses.  The  dead  do  not  know  they  are 
dead.  They  think  they  are  still  here.  Well,  perhaps 
they  are.  Perhaps  they  are  the  ghosts  of  whom  one 
hears  and  never  sees." 

From  her  lips  it  sprang  out  at  me,  the  central  sit- 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  81 

uation  for  a  novel  and  commercially  I  exclaimed, 
'That's  it!" 

There  again  she  must  have  missed  it.  She  looked 
but  she  did  not  speak. 

"Shop,"  I  told  her.  "To  a  chap  in  my  trade  nothing 
comes  amiss.  We  make  copy  out  of  our  own  disasters. 

She  laughed,  and  in  laughing  her  resemblance  to 
Nelly  Chilton  became  not  startling  merely,  but  exact. 

Without  mentioning  it,  I  sat  back.  "Yes,  but  the 
point  is  elsewhere  or  rather  it  is  here.  I  have  been 
threshing  about  for  a  plot.  A  moment  ago  before  you 
sat  the  needy  knife-grinder.  Now  he  is  needy  no 
longer.  You  have  suggested  a  story.  And  hello!" 
I  interrupted  myself  to  exclaim,  "here  comes  the  title, 
The  bourne  from  which ?" 

Noiselessly  she  clapped  her  fingers.  "A  ghost  story ! 
There  never  has  been  a  good  one.  The  chance  is 
yours.  Take  it.  The  title  itself  should  inspire.  The 
bourne  from  which " 

She  paused  and  added,  "I  wonder,  though,  if  every 
reader  can  fill  out  the  rest  of  it.  Yet,  even  incorrectly 
given,  'The  bourne  from  which  no  traveller  returns'  is 
too  long." 

"Well,"  I  said,  "when  it  appears,  if  it  ever  does  ap 
pear,  you  must  let  me  bring  you  a  copy." 

"Thank  you.    You  will  find  it  easier  to  mail  it." 

"You  are  not  leaving  here,  are  you?" 

"Next  week.    I  go  to  Paris." 

As  she  spoke  she  went  to  the  piano,  rippled  the  keys 
and  hummed  rather  than  sang  the  valse  chantante, 
O  Paris,  gai  sejour! 

Desisting,  she  turned.  "The  house  where  I  am  is 
sending  me.  You  shall  have  the  address." 


82  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"I  congratulate  you.  But  the  story  will  keep  until 
you  return.  Besides  it  would  clash  with  that  gaiety. 
If  I  can,  I  want  to  make  the  reader  shriek  with  fright, 
tear  his  hair  out  and  hide  under  the  bed." 

She  laughed.     uThe  shiver  at  last!" 

On  that  high  note  I  would  have  gone,  but  from 
somewhere  Signor  Matouchi  appeared  and  yawned  at 
me.  I  tickled  him  in  the  stomach.  Ostentatiously,  he 
purred. 

Then,  kissing  her  hand,  I  left. 


XI 

A  WEEK  later  I  would  have  burned  an  incense-wand, 
only  I  did  not  happen  to  have  one.  A  message  had 
reached  me.  If  I  had  dictated  it  myself  it  could  not 
have  been  more  to  my  taste.  It  was  a  message  which 
either  clairvoyantly  or  sympathetically  Aly  Bolton  had 
divined.  Bradish  would  recover.  That  was  all.  There 
are  brevities  that  are  enormous.  It  was  at  the  ampli 
tude  of  this  brevity  that  I  would  have  burned  an 
incense-wand. 

The  message  was  from  Cally.  It  had  come  from  his 
office.  That  day  I  looked  in  there.  I  found  him  at 
a  vast  table  on  which  was  a  riding  crop  and  a  box  of 
cigars.  Nothing  else,  except  over  the  table  his  in 
fernal  blandness,  two  fingers  and  a  moment's  talk. 

The  fingers  withdrawn  he  pointed  one  at  me. 

"What  have  you  behind  the  forehead?" 

"Pulp." 

"In  that  pulp  the  objective  changes  of  the  external 
world  are  converted  into  the  subjective  changes  of 
consciousness.  But  in  what  manner  the  conversion 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  83 

is  effected  no  one  knows  and,  in  our  day,  no  one  will." 

"What  of  it?" 

"A  lesion  of  the  occipital  cortex  may  affect  that 
mystery.  Bradish  has  a  lesion  of  that  nature.  He 
will  recover,  but  whether  mentally  he  is  the  same  man 
again  depends  on  circumstances  which  I  am  now  too 
idle  to  explain." 

He  stood  up.     "Come  again  when  I  am  busy." 

A  hand  on  my  elbow,  he  was  edging  me  along, 
dangling  the  keys  of  Destiny  at  me. 

I  shook  him  off.     "When  can  I  see  him?" 

"When  I  have  him  in  town.  You  can  see  him  then, 
that  is  if  he  does  not  object." 

Mephistophelianly  Cagliostro  smiled.  It  was  as 
though  he  were  adding:  "If  it  were  I  now,  you'd 
never  get  in." 

I,  too,  can  smile  and  I  said:  "I'll  pay  you  for  that. 
By  the  Lord  Harry,  I'll  put  you  in  a  book." 

Blandly  he  shoved  me  out.  "It  takes  genius  to  con 
coct  a  horrible  revenge." 

Well,  he  was  right.  As  I  turned  the  corner  I 
thought  of  ^Eschylus,  before  whose  spectres  women 
swooned,  and  I  wished  for  his  stylus,  a  wish  instantly 
replaced  by  a  hope.  I  had  walked  straight  into  Aly 
Bolton  and  I  hoped  she  was  dying  of  hunger. 

"Look!"  I  exclaimed.  "Over  there!  A  few  streets 
down !  A  man  is  beckoning  at  you  I" 

"Very  impertinent  of  him.    Who  is  he?" 

"A  sorcerer.  He  is  calling,  'Miss  Bolton!  Miss 
Bolton!  Come  to  my  arms  and  before  you  I  will  set 
strawberries  and  creme  Merge,  plovers'  eggs  beaten 
into  an  amber  foam,  quinces  on  platters  of  jade!'  ' 

Always  gracious,  she  smiled  and  turned  and  together 


84  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

we  went  down  the  street,  packed  as  at  that  hour  it 
always  was  with  envy,  greed  and  other  things  that  do 
not  look  nice  in  print,  yet  to  which  she  seemed  indiffer 
ent  or  else  unconscious  .  .  . 

She  said  nothing  and  her  silence  was  very  confiden 
tial.  It  was  as  though  she  were  saying  to  me,  We 
talk  the  same  tongue  and  in  that  tongue  there  is  no 
need  for  speech. 

Silence  has  its  licenses  and  I  am  sure  she  had  no 
intention  of  according  me  any.  The  trick  of  eye,  of 
look,  of  way,  the  arts  rehearsed  before  a  mirror,  the 
little  spells  a  girl  may  cast,  if  only  for  practise,  she 
disdained  or  else  ignored.  Her  silence  may  or  may 
not  have  been  confidential.  It  was  not  provocative. 

In  the  gastronomic  El  Dorado  which  presently  we 
entered,  her  attitude  changed  necessarily.  Yet  it  was 
I  who  spoke  first  and  not  to  her  but  to  the  waiter. 

When  he  had  gone,  she  said  with  that  irrelevance 
which  is  always  so  apropos: 

"And  the  ghost  story?" 

Ten  minutes  earlier  Cally  had  shaken  the  keys  of 

Destiny  at  me.  I  was  yet  to  learn  that  the  Urim  and 
Thummim  were  then  in  her  hands  from  which  she  was 
shedding  the  gloves. 

The  gloves  were  white,  her  costume  was  dark,  ad 
mirably  made,  equally  simple.  I  lack  the  huxter's  eye 
but  I  knew  it  was  not  a  bargain,  and  suddenly  I  re 
captured  a  sensation  which  I  had  not  experienced  for 
years,  that  of  intimate  association  with  a  charming 
and  beautiful  girl. 

At  once,  and  with  the  same  irrelevance,  I  began 
about  a  house  in  which  I  had  lived. 

"The  house  was  back  from  the  road.     The  door- 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  85 

way  extended  up  to  and  through  the  second  story.  Be 
fore  the  house  was  a  high  wall  of  grey  stone.  Above 
was  a  grey  sky.  Under  the  house  was  a  cellar,  which 
is  the  usual  place  for  a  cellar,  but  beneath  it  was  an 
other  cellar.  In  the  second  cellar  were  barrels.  In 
the  barrels  was  gold." 

'Tours?" 

"I  do  not  know.  I  do  not  know  where  the  house  is. 
I  do  not  know  how  long  ago  I  lived  there.  As  a 
child,  the  memory  of  it  was  vivid.  It  seemed  as 
neighbourly  as  the  day  before.  Perhaps  it  was.  Time 
is  very  relative.  It  may  be  that  there  is  no  such  thing. 
Kant  said  that.  Kant  said  that  time  is  a  category  of 
the  intellect.  As  a  child  I  did  not  know  it.  As  a  child 
it  seemed  to  me  that  I  had  just  come  from  that  house 
of  which  my  people  knew  nothing.  Since  then  I  have 
realised  that  I  lived  there  in  a  previous  existence.  But 
I  have  always  felt  that  I  shall  find  the  house  again  and 
just  now  I  felt  that  when  I  do  find  it,  I  shall  find  in  it 
a  girl  who  will  look  like  you." 

"A  compliment  should  be  brief.  That  is  the  most 
elaborate  compliment  I  ever  heard." 

She  smiled  as  she  said  it,  but  she  smiled  as  much  at 
the  waiter  as  at  me.  The  waiter  was  showing  her, 
not  the  plovers'  eggs  that  carelessly  I  had  promised, 
but  a  salmi  Sardanapale. 

When  he  had  served  it,  she  said:  "That  is  the  great 
advantage  of  being  a  novelist.  A  novelist  can  imagine 
things  that  never  happened,  that  never  could  happen, 
but  which  are  real  to  him." 

Without  transition,  as  though  wanting  to  get  away 
from  it,  she  added:  "This  salmi  must  have  been 
cooked  in  a  jewelled  pan." 


86  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Leisurely  I  drew  her  back.  "You  are  entirely  right, 
but  so  too  am  I.  Epictetus  advised  us  to  cheat  our 
selves  and  dream.  But  do  we  cheat  ourselves  when 
we  recall  what  we  did  in  a  previous  life?  From  the 
majority,  any  and  all  memory  of  it  is  withheld.  That 
is  very  merciful.  If  people  remembered  what  they  did 
when  they  were  here  before,  a  hundred  and  one  out  of 
ninety-nine  would  go  mad." 

Whether  it  were  that  last  word  that  prompted,  or 
whether  it  were  due  to  unconscious  telepathy,  I  do  not 
know  and  I  do  not  believe  she  knew  either,  but,  dis 
missing  the  subject,  she  said: 

"How  is  Mr.  Bradish?" 

"I  was  just  coming  from  his  physician  when  I  met 
you.  He  said  that  Bradish  has  a  lesion  that  may  re 
sult  in  cerebral  deglutinisation.  That's  a  bit  stiff.  Un 
til  latterly,  Bradish  was  the  sanest  man  I  knew.  But 
latterly  he  went  quite  mad  over  Nelly  Chilton  and  while 
I  do  not  blame  him  for  that — how  can  I  when  you  are 
her  living  image? — yet,  assuming  that  he  recovers, 
then  when  he  learns  she  is  gone  and  gone  too  just  when 
he  had  her,  it  might  topple  him  completely." 

She  nodded  understandingly  and  stood  up.  She  was 
going,  she  had  much  to  do  she  said,  as  she  thanked  me, 
and  I  saw  her  to  the  door,  to  the  eager  sunshine,  to 
the  crowd  that  took  her  and  hid  her  away.  Behind 
me,  from  an  orchestra  in  the  restaurant,  came  a  strain 
sweet  and  slow.  I  had  never  heard  it  before.  I  heard 
it  afterward.  I  heard  it  every  time  I  thought  of  her 
until  I  saw  her  again,  which  then  was  a  long  way  off. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  87 

XII 

SINCE  then,  in  looking  back,  it  has  seemed  to  me 
that  the  Daughters  of  Hazard  that  threw  Nelly  Chil- 
ton  into  a  stone  vault,  sank  Bradish  into  depths  where 
Death  alone  could  follow,  and  then,  because  there  are 
other  depths,  depths  which  only  the  living  can  enter, 
because  he  had  not  suffered  enough,  because  he  must 
suffer  more,  recalled  him  that  he  might  know  what 
pain  is. 

Then  it  was  that,  in  the  voids  where  he  lay,  an 
artery  reached  and  drew  him.  His  scattered  senses, 
satisfied  with  their  temporary  decentralisation,  resisted. 
During  the  subtle  struggle,  fought  in  a  dim  corridor 
of  the  brain,  a  memory  stirred  and  spoke.  Along  the 
corridor  two  syllables  sounded  remotely.  They  were 
as  taps  on  a  damp  drum  beaten  obscurely  behind  the 
shelves  of  thought.  They  awoke  no  echo,  evoked  no 
image.  Drifted  by  the  currents  of  unconsciousness, 
they  passed.  But  the  currents,  barred  by  assembling 
ideas,  broke  to  their  murmur.  A  memory  that  had 
gone,  looked  back.  The  taps  on  the  drum  sounded 
less  dumbly.  From  behind  the  shelves  of  thought  a 
face  peered  out.  On  the  lips  of  the  sleeper  there 
formed  a  name. 

"Nelly!" 

His  eyes  opened.  Before  him  was  a  woman,  plain, 
strange,  dressed  after  the  manner  of  the  Belle  Choco- 
latiere.  His  eyes  closed,  partially  they  reopened  and, 
quite  as  though  he  were  back  in  earlier  Parisian  days, 
he  said,  and  distinctly  enough: 

"A  boire!" 

"Bravol"  I  said  when  I  heard  of  it. 


88  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Subsequently,  Cally  had  him  removed  to  the  great 
white  staring  house  where  at  last  I  went,  and  where  I 
found  him  convalescent,  collected,  entirely  rational, 
apparently  as  sane  as  before. 

At  the  time,  he  was  in  the  library  and  as  I  entered 
he  got  up  and  limped  toward  me.  Loosely  his  clothes 
hung  about  him.  The  spider  reduced,  had  paled. 
Then,  before  I  could  attempt  to  condole,  for  the  at 
tempt  at  condolence  is  all  one  can  make,  he  surprisingly 
eluded  it. 

"These  chairs  are  beastly.  There  is  not  a  chair  in 
the  whole  house  that  is  fit  to  sit  in.  Formerly  I  did  not 
notice.  One  chair  was  as  good  as  another.  But  since 
I  have  been  up,  I  find  I  want,  well,  what  we  all  want, 
what  I  lack.  I  must  send  Peters  around  to  pick  up 
something  decent." 

I  lit  a  cigarette.  "See  here,  old  chap,  you  will  be 
having  a  birthday  soon.  Sensible  people  have  birth 
days  all  the  time.  I'll  give  you  one." 

"What?     A  birthday?" 

UA  chair." 

"You  are  becoming  singularly  generous.  But  I  want 
to  ask  you.  How  did  she  look?" 

I  hesitated  and  he  added,  "I  asked  Cally." 

"He  wasn't  there.  I  rather  botched  a  message  to 
him.  He  did  not  reach  the  manor  until  afterward." 

"So  he  told  me.    How  did  she  look?" 

Fishing,  I  found  the  picture.  "As  though  sur 
rounded  by  the  ineffable." 

He  held  it  up.  I  could  see  him  visualising  it.  "Yes, 
that  would  be  Nelly." 

Still  holding  it,  he  continued,  "I  don't  believe  a  word 
of  it." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  89 

I  stared.    "Of  what?" 

"Of  her  death.    I  can't  believe  it." 

That  seemed  natural  and  I  told  him  so.  "Of  course 
not  If  the  circumstances  were  reversed  I  could  not 
either." 

Then,  at  once,  anxious  to  get  him  away  from  it,  I 
tried  a  twist.  "Cally  says  what  you  need  now  is  a 
change.  He  said  Paris." 

"Paris  would  not  help  me.    I  have  supped  on  her." 

"Yes,  but  the  supper  was  years  ago.  Now  it  is  din 
ner  time.  Before  all  this  happened,  I  wrote  a  panto 
mime.  I  can't  place  it  here.  Recently  a  showman, 
an  odiously  familiar  brute,  clapped  me  on  the  back  and 
said,  'Produce  the  stuff  in  Paris  and  I'll  import  the 
troupe.' ' 

Bradish  shifted.  "I  know  Chose  of  the  Neuvelles, 
and  if  Machin  has  not  forgotten  me,  I  know  him,  too." 

"At  all  events  Emile  has  not  forgotten  you,  or  me 
either.  I  gave  him  twenty  louis  the  last  time  I  was 
there." 

"Emile?" 

"Don't  you  remember  sweet  Alice,  Ben  Bolt  ?  Don't 
you  remember  how  he  used  to  rub  his  hands  and  ask, 
'And  what  will  ces  messieurs  be  good  enough  to  be 
willing  to  desire?'  ' 

"The  man 'at  the  Cafe  Anglais?" 

"Precisely.  We  can  have  Chose  and  Machin  there 
and,  with  the  champagne  at  their  throats,  one  or  the 
other  will  disgorge  a  contract.  Then,  on  the  first 
night,  when  they  call  for  the  author,  you  can  appear 
and  I'll  shy  a  bouquet  at  you." 

"I  don't  know  that  I  would  like  that." 

"Of  course  you  will.     That  will  be  in  the  autumn 


90  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

and,  meanwhile,  there  is  Spain  and  the  bullfighters,  and 
the  gipsies  and  the  cigarreras  and  the  highwaymen 
and,  under  the  stars,  their  little  dramas  of  love  and 
hate  that  spend  themselves  not  in  a  scene  but  in  a 
murder." 

'That's  Granada." 

I  saw  he  was  getting  interested  and  I  was  about  to 
strum  another  air  when  Peters  appeared. 

We  went  in  to  luncheon,  during  which  I  kept  talking 
of  the  Andalusia  I  knew  and  loved,  sending  his 
thoughts  skimming  afar;  promenading  him  along  the 
crocus  and  pink  Delicias;  seating  him  before  the 
castagnettes  and  guitars;  showing  him  the  flamenco; 
the  slim,  twisting  waists,  the  eyes  burning  above  butter 
fly  fans;  scenting  it  all  with  the  odour  of  almonds,  the 
smell  of  grape. 

He  looked  up.    "When  could  you  go?" 
"This  minute.    Call  a  cab." 

"You   seem   to   have   a   Golconda   of   enthusiasm! 
What  do  you  say  to  a  shot  at  next  week?" 
"Ole  tu  madre!    Hurrah  for  your  mother !" 
Behind  the  hurrah,  a  hallelujah  followed.      There 
he  sat,  white,  gaunt,  shaken,  sane.     Save  for  the  re 
mark  that  he  did  not  believe  the  dead  was  dead,  a  re 
mark  qualified  by  the  supplement  that  he  could  not 
believe  it,  he  had  said  nothing  that  was  not  humdrum, 
commonplace,  normal.    Previously,  I  had  thought  that 
with  time,  in  which  everything  breaks,  wears  itself  out, 
passes  away,  resignation  would  come  and  forgetful- 
ness  with  it.     But  though  he  still  remembered   and 
though,  too,  the  memory  must  have  been  poignant, 
already  he  was  resigned.    So  I  thought.    That  opinion 
I  shortly  and  entirely  altered. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  91 

XIII 

ON  the  floor  were  cigarettes,  boots,  books,  shirts, 
coats,  trousers,  enough  for  a  trunk,  a  big  trunk,  and, 
as  I  hate  trunks,  I  was  meditating  how  to  get  it  all 
into  a  bag.  The  problem  was  pretty,  it  partook  of 
geometry  which  I  also  hate.  In  similar  circumstances 
a  poet  would  have  omitted  to  meditate.  A  poet  would 
have  called  for  his  harp  and  composed  a  song.  But 
I  am  a  practical  man  and  I  decided  that  if,  but  this 
once,  I  could  stuff  everything  in,  for  the  next  few 
months  Peters,  or  Gedney,  or  both,  would  attend  to 
the  stuffing. 

Then  again  came  the  rattle  of  Destiny's  keys.  At 
the  time  I  did  not  know  it.  I  mistook  the  shaken 
keys  for  a  tradesman  knocking,  bill  in  hand,  at  my 
door.  As  I  was  out  of  commission,  copyless,  with 
nothing  more  commercial  in  my  head  than  the  fringes 
of  that  ghost  story,  I  did  not  swear,  I  did  not  care. 
I  went  on  and  opened. 

There  was  Bradish. 

Not  for  a  moment  had  I  imagined  it  was  he  and  I 
stared. 

"What  have  you  done  with  your  earthquake  ?" 

He  limped  in,  limped  along  to  the  workshop,  sat 
down,  tapped  at  his  teeth. 

I  waved  at  the  floor.  "You  couldn't  loan  me  Peters 
for  an  hour,  could  you?" 

Whether  he  heard  or  not  is  unimportant.  He  had 
been  looking  down,  he  looked  up  and  bit  at  his  under- 
lip.  As  I  afterward  thought,  he  was  steadying  it. 
Then  it  came. 

"I  have  seen  her." 


92  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

I,  too,  sat  down.     "Seen  whom?" 
"Nelly." 

Until  then  I  had  not  noticed  the  spider.  It  was  so 
violently  red  that  I  wondered  if  he  had  been  drinking 
and  I  tried  to  humour  him. 

uYes,  of  course.     Occasionally  I  see  her  also." 

"I  tell  you  I  actually  saw  her." 

I  thought  of  Aly  Bolton  and  I  said,  "Look  here,  old 
chap,  you  have  seen  someone  who  resembles  her." 

He  got  up,  took  a  cigarette  from  the  floor,  lit  it, 
sat  down  again. 

"Nobody  resembles  her.  In  all  the  world  she  is 
unique." 

Well,  you  are  wrong,  I  thought,  but  I  said:  "There 
is  no  such  thing  as  mystery,  there  is  only  ignorance 
and  with  that  I  am  abundantly  supplied." 

Yet,  as  I  said  that,  I  told  myself  that  whomever  he 
had  seen  could  not  be  Aly  Bolton.  She  had  gone. 

Gloomily  he  flicked  his  ashes :  "I  suppose  you  think 
me  crazy." 

I  smiled  at  him.  "I  would  think  you  abnormal  if 
you  were  not.  In  open  court  here,  Spitzka,  testifying 
as  an  expert,  said  that  all  men  are  insane.  In  France, 
Janet  said  the  same  thing.  Do  you  object  to  the  evi 
dence?" 

He  laughed  fiercely.    "Not  if  it  includes  you." 

Glad  that  he  laughed,  I  laughed  also.  "Well,  then, 
the  company  I  am  in  is  nothing  to  boast  of.  But 
seriously  now,  you  know  as  well  as  I  do,  and  probably 
better,  that  alcohol  or  morphine  can  produce  hallucina 
tions  which,  though  actually  seen,  represent  merely  the 
observer's  mental  condition." 

He  shook  the  cigarette.     "You  are  talking  rubbish. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  93 

I  don't  drink,  at  least  not  to  excess,  and  I  don't  take 
morphine,  though  I  have  had  enough  to  drive  me  to 


it." 


"Yes,  I  know.  But  I  know  too  that  any  strong 
emotion  can  have  the  same  result.  Why,  good  Lord! 
everybody  knows  that  the  attendants  at  morgues  have 
to  be  on  their  guard  against  the  false  identification  of 
the  dead.  People  go  there  distracted  by  grief  at  the 
loss  of  a  relative  and  with  the  image  of  that  relative 
so  glued  to  the  retina  that  they  identify  the  first  body 
they  see." 

He  gave  a  sort  of  groan.  "I  did  not  come  here  to 
exchange  stupidities,  my  mind  is  clear  as  a  bell." 

"And  so  you  will  admit  was  Balzac's.  Balzac  in 
tended  to  give  Gautier  a  horse.  He  forgot  to,  but  he 
talked  so  much  about  it  that  he  believed  he  had  given 
it  and  used  to  ask  Gautier  how  the  horse  behaved. 
From  that  you  can  realise  what  the  imagination  is. 
You  imagine  you  have  seen  the  dead,  whereas  you  know 
that  that  is  impossible." 

"Impossible?"  he  angrily  repeated.  "Time  and 
again  I  have  heard  you  say  that  the  word  ought  to  be 
kicked  out  of  the  dictionary." 

"Well,  except  in  connection  with  pure  mathematics, 
so  it  should  be.  If,  as  Huxley  said,  we  understood  all 
that  is  implied  in  so  common  an  instance  as  an  ob 
ject  that  falls,  we  would  not  doubt  the  possibility  of 

any   occurrence   however    incredible.      At   the    same 

» 
time 

"See  here,  I  am  not  drunk  or  doped  or  a  novelist. 
I  don't  care  what  Huxley  said,  what  you  say,  what 
anyone  says.  I  saw  her." 

Argument  weakens  all  things.     I  yielded. 


94  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Very  good  then,  where  was  it?'  ' 

"In  the  Park." 

"In  the  Park!    How  in  the  Park?" 

He  fumbled  and  produced  some  papers.  "I  had 
been  to  the  French  line.  They  hadn't  much,  but  I  got 
the  captain's  cabin,  the  first  officer's  cabin.  Here  they 
are.  On  the  way  up,  the  car  took  the  Park.  Near  the 
carousal  I  saw  her.  She  was  alone.  She  was  on  foot. 
I  got  out.  There  were  people  just  ahead  of  her.  As 
I  got  out  she  passed  beyond  them.  For  a  moment,  I 
lost  sight  of  her.  There  are  steps  there.  They  lead 
to  a  lake.  I  thought  she  must  be  on  them.  From  the 
top  you  can  see  all  around  and  I  looked  everywhere. 
Not  a  sign  of  her.  She  had  vanished.  Like  that!" 

"Hold  on!  Did  you  see  anyone  you  might  have 
mistaken  for  her?" 

"I  could  not  mistake  children  for  her,  could  I?  Or 
old  women,  or  nursemaids,  or  babies,  or  a  boy  in  a 
boat  on  the  lake?  No.  I  mistook  no  one  for  her. 
Believe  me  or  not,  it  was  she." 

I,  too,  helped  myself  to  a  cigarette  from  the  floor. 
As  I  lighted  it,  I  nodded  at  him. 

"But  I  want  to  believe  you,  only — and  for  heaven's 
sake  don't  think  I  am  jesting — only  you  would  have 
made  it  a  bit  easier  if  you  had  said  you  had  seen  her 
at  night,  in  the  old-fashioned  way,  at  the  foot  of  your 
bed,  sticking  her  tongue  at  you." 

He  shook  his  head.  "It  was  not  her  ghost,  if  that's 
what  you  mean.  It  was  she,  alive,  Nelly  Chilton  in 
flesh  and  blood." 

When  he  said  that  I  was  less  eager  to  have  that  poor 
vagrant  of  a  word  kicked  out  of  the  dictionary.  What 
he  said  was  impossible  and  yet,  as  I  had  to  recognise, 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  95 

for  the  impossibility  of  it  there  was  a  good  measure  of 
excuse.  The  sum  total  of  all  he  knew  about  her  death 
was  hearsay.  He  had  been  flying  along  with  her  in 
the  open  and,  without  transition,  he  was  in  bed,  a 
strange  woman  looking  at  him.  Of  intervening  events 
he  had  no  knowledge  whatever.  There  were  not  only 
no  intervening  events,  there  was  not  even  an  inter 
vening  blankness.  The  last  instant  before  he  lost  con 
sciousness  and  the  first  instant  when  he  recovered  it, 
met  and  fused.  Mercifully  he  had  felt  nothing,  heard 
nothing,  seen  nothing.  Since  then  he  had  felt  and 
acutely.  He  had  heard,  and  crushingly.  But  of  the 
anterior  moments  and  hours  and  days  and  weeks  and 
all  that  had  been  packed  into  them,  he  had  but  the 
evidence  of  his  own  injuries  and  such  information  as 
others  supplied. 

Supported  by  the  injuries,  the  information  was 
credible.  But  human  nature  does  not  always  accept 
the  merely  credible.  That  which,  in  nearly  killing  him, 
had  thoroughly  killed  her,  constituted  a  shock  so  over 
whelming  that  he  had  not  assimilated  it.  In  any  catas 
trophe  there  is  always  a  sense  of  unreality  and  the 
seeming  unreality  of  the  girl's  death  must  have  been 
with  him  until  just  then,  a  little  before,  when  in  the 
Park,  the  sight  of  someone  had  accentuated  the  un 
reality  and  convinced  him,  at  any  rate  for  the  time 
being,  that  she  was  not  dead,  but  alive.  After  all,  he 
had  not  seen  her,  as  I  had,  in  her  coffin,  and  of  those 
who  had  seen  her,  I  was  his  only  witness. 

"Where  is  Mrs.  Chilton?"  I  asked. 

"Somewhere  in  France.  My  lawyers  have  the  ad 
dress.  Why  do  you  ask?" 

"And  Mrs.  Trefusis?" 


96  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Newport,  I  fancy.    What  do  you  want  of  her?" 

"If  Mrs.  Chilton  were  in  town  I  would  ask  you  to 
see  her.  As  she  is  not  and  as  Mrs.  Trefusis  is  away,  I 
do  wish  you  would  see  Austen  or  Renwick,  or  some 
body." 

"What  good  would  it  do  ?" 

"Jim,  look  here.  At  present  I  am  the  only  one  you 
have  talked  to  who  was  at  the  funeral.  I  wish  you 
would  talk  to  some  of  the  others.  They  could  only 
substantiate  what  I  have  told  you,  but  what  I  have 
told  you  has  not  been  enough.  What  you  would  hear 
from  them  would  be  cumulative  and  convincing.  You 
would  know  from  it  that  you  are  mistaken  about  what 
you  saw,  or  thought  you  saw,  in  the  Park.  Besides  I 
dare  say  Cally  could  explain  it." 

"I  dare  say  he  could.  But  he  and  the  seven  sages 
in  active  collaboration  could  not  explain  it  away." 

"I  am  not  so  sure.  Cally  told  me  you  had  a  lesion 
of  the  occipital  cortex.  At  the  time  he  did  not  know, 
or  professed  not  to  know,  how  it  might  result.  My 
own  ignorance  being  unfathomable,  I  looked  it  up  and 
I  found  that  in  cases  such  as  yours  there  may  be  an 
impairment  of  vision." 

"Yes,  that's  true.  At  first  I  could  not  distinguish 
objects  very  clearly,  but  that  has  gone.  I  can  see  now 
as  well  as  ever." 

"No  doubt  you  think  so.  Lots  of  people  are  colour 
blind  and  have  not  the  slightest  suspicion  of  it." 

"Yes,  and  lots  of  people  are  stupid  and  don't  suspect 
it  either..  But  their  stupidity  does  not  affect  me.  I 
saw  her.  There  is  not  the  peradventure  of  a  doubt 
about  it." 

Mentally,  at  that,  I  threw  up  my  hands.    I  did  not 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  97 

know  what  to  say  and,  before  I  could  determine,  he 
was  at  it  from  another  angle. 

"I  want  you  to  help  me." 

Theoretically,  it  is  a  privilege  to  help  anyone. 
Actually,  it  is  the  guano  of  ingratitude.  Yet,  weak  as 
water,  I  nodded  at  him. 

"Well,  then,  since  she  was  in  the  Park  today,  she 
may  be  there  tomorrow.  It  was  about  noon  when  I 
saw  her  and  tomorrow  at  eleven  I  shall  station  myself 
at  the  top  of  the  steps  and  I  want  you  to  be  at  the 
bottom.  Will  you?" 

It  was  sheer  insanity  but,  though  insanity  has  always 
appealed  to  me,  I  did  not  at  once  agree. 

"Assuming,  not  for  argument's  sake,  but  just  to 
avoid  one,  that  it  was  your  wife  you  saw,  it  is  not 
cricket  to  trap  her.  If  it  was  a  ghost  your  attitude 
should  be  equally  correct." 

"But  it  is  she  who  is  not  running  straight." 

"All  the  more  reason  then  why  you  should." 

He  got  up,  lit  another  cigarette  and  began  limping 
about.  It  seemed  to  me  that  I  had  tangled  him  and, 
with  my  usual  weakness,  I  switched. 

"I'll  go  you.  If  I  see  her,  I  will  salute  her.  If  you 
see  her,  you  will  of  course  do  the  same.  But  if  I  were 
you,  and  mind  you  I  am  not,  but  if  I  were,  I  would 
stop  there.  To  attempt  in  any  way  to  detain  or  address 
her,  unless  she  invites  it,  would  be  an  evil  act." 

He  turned  on  me.  "I  can't  see  where  the  evil 
would  be." 

"Yes,  you  do,  you  see  perfectly.  You  know  it  would 
show  a  total  lack  of  consideration  for  her  personal 
independence.  If  Renwick  had  not  mumbled  a  dozen 
phrases  over  you  both,  you  would  never  dream  of  it. 


9 8  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Because  he  did,  that  does  not  make  her  your  thing. 
But  all  this  is  utter  nonsense.  You  did  not  see  her  and 
what  you  did  not  see,  you  will  not  see  again.  None 
the  less  I'll  go  you.  I'll  go  you  because  I  hate  the 
humdrum  and  love  the  insane." 

I  broke  off  and  added:  "Can  you  loan  me  Peters 
for  a  minute  or  two?" 

"Peters?  Yes.  Certainly.  What  do  you  want  him 
for?" 

"You  may  not  know  it,  but  he  is  a  genius.  He  can 
pack.  It  is  more  than  I  can  do." 

"Pack!    Pack  for  what?" 

"Sevilla!  Granada!  Cadiz!  There  are  the  tickets, 
I'll  toss  you  now.  What  did  you  pay?  I'll  toss  you 
and  give  you  a  cheque  for  the  one  I  lose." 

"Oh!"  he  said  longingly.  "You  are  still  going,  are 
you?" 

"Of  course  I  am  and  so  are  you." 

"Not  now,  not  until  I  find  Nelly." 

I  could  not  budge  him.  I  tried,  but  not  very  hard. 
I  knew  the  harder  I  tried  the  more  mulish  he  would 
become,  but  I  knew,  too,  that  if  I  said  little  or  nothing, 
sooner  or  later  he  would  veer,  suggest  whatever  I 
had  and  believe  the  suggestion  his  own.  Not  a  very 
original  process  perhaps,  but  I  have  found  it  the  only 
way  in  which  one  can  live  in  comfort  with  unoriginal 
people. 

Consequently  I  threw  up  the  sponge.  "All  right, 
Granada  will  keep.  But  you're  mad,  mad  as  a  hatter, 
mad  as  two  hatters,  mad  as  Lincoln  and  Bennett." 

"Then  you  will  be  there  at  eleven  tomorrow?" 

"I  will  be  there  at  ten  fifty-nine." 

He  limped  along.    I  saw  him  out,  heard  him  lumber 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  99 

down  the  stair,  crossed  the  landing  and  rang  at  Aly 
Bolton's  door. 

It  opened  and  a  frowsy  lady  said:  "Are  you  the 
gasman?" 

"Yes,"  I  replied.  "But  not  your  gasman  and,  be 
lieve  me,  I  deplore  it  deeply." 

"Get  along  with  you.    What  do  you  want?" 

"Miss  Bolton's  address." 

The  lady  displayed  the  most  distressing  mouth  I 
ever  saw. 

"Are  you  meaning  the  party  as  was  here?  I  never 
seen  her.  Likely  the  janitor  can  tell  you.  Is  it  a 
bill?" 

"For  the  rent" — in  my  heart,  I  would  have  added 
but  she  closed  the  door. 

XIV 

FOR  the  purposes  of  that  story  of  mine,  already  I 
had  looked  over  the  papers  published  by  the  Society  for 
Psychical  Research  and,  greatly  to  my  amazement,  dis 
covered  what  I  already  knew,  that  the  ego  persists 
after  death.  But  evidence  of  the  persistence  of  the 
ego  is  not  evidence  that  it  revisits  the  glimpses  of  the 
moon.  In  the  whole  interminable  set  of  records  there 
is  not  one  authoritatively  established  ghost. 

And  yet,  either  Bradish  had  seen  a  ghost  or  else  he 
was  mad. 

It  is  true  he  might  have  been  lying  and  I  would  have 
given  him  the  benefit  of  that  doubt  if  I  had  known  him 
less  long  and  less  well.  It  was  not  that  he  could  not 
lie  and  did  not  lie,  for  he  did  lie,  as  we  all  have  to  lie, 
out  of  consideration  and  civility  if  nothing  else.  But  in 


ioo  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

his  cock-and-bull  story  I  knew  that  he  had  been  telling, 
not  the  truth  certainly,  but  what  was  truth  to  him. 

I  got  up  from  the  table,  to  which  I  had  returned 
from  the  frowsy  lady,  and  kicked  my  clothes  about. 

But  good  Lord!  I  mentally  exclaimed.  What  pon 
derable  reason  have  I  for  saying  that  it  is  not  the 
truth  ?  The  fact  that  there  has  been  no  authoritatively 
established  ghost  does  not  prove  that  there  cannot 
be  one. 

Dissatisfied  with  the  reductio,  I  kicked  again  and 
tried  to  look  at  the  matter  from  the  angle  of  insanity. 
Cally  had  waved  that  flag.  Yet,  apart  from  the  deter 
mination  with  which  Bradish  had  clung  to  the  idea  that 
he  had  seen  Nelly  Chilton,  he  seemed  normal  as  you 
please,  to  me  at  least,  but  while  I  knew  precious  little 
about  insanity,  I  did  know  that  the  presence  of  an  idea, 
fixed  and  erroneous,  is  the  surest  proof  of  dementia. 
The  idea  might  therefore  show  that  he  was  mad,  unless, 
of  course,  it  were  not  erroneous. 

But  that  is  nonsense,  I  decided.  He  did  not  see  the 
the  dead,  he  did  not  see  a  ghost.  If  he  saw  anybody, 
it  was  Aly  Bolton,  and  yet  how  could  he?  She  is  not 
here. 

But  I  am  here,  I  disgustedly  reflected,  and  what  is 
worse,  I  argue  with  myself.  I  don't  wonder  the  frowsy 
lady  mistook  me  for  a  gasman. 

Then  back  to  me,  from  over  the  way,  the  possibility 
trotted.  It  might  be  Aly  Bolton.  Apparently  she  had 
gone.  On  the  other  hand,  she  might  not  have.  She 
had  said  she  was  going  and  though  clearly  she  had 
vacated  the  walkup,  it  did  not  follow  that  she  had 
vacated  New  York.  Then,  suddenly,  I  realised  that  I 
knew  nothing  whatever  about  her,  realised  also,  and 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  101 

for  the  first  time,  that  while  seemingly  frank  as  an 
open  newspaper,  actually  she  might  be  secretive  as  a 
sealed  book. 

Exceedingly  lovely,  clothed  in  riddles,  in  her  two- 
by-four  flat,  she  had  been  out  of  place  as  a  piano  in  a 
pantry.  Her  natural  atmosphere  was  the  spaciousness 
of  some  spacious  domain.  What  she  had  was  the 
stuffiness  of  a  furniture  shop.  That  in  itself  was 
incongruous.  Yet,  apart  from  it,  where  did  she  go? 
what  did  she  do?  For  all  I  knew  to  the  contrary, 
privately  she  might  be  a  Borgia  and  publicly  a  bac 
chante.  She  suggested  none  of  these  things.  What 
she  did  suggest  was  a  soul  singularly  evolved.  But 
even  though  she  were  not,  even  though  she  were  no 
better  than  the  law  allows,  her  charm  prevailed.  That 
charm  had  inundated  me.  Because  of  it  I  knew,  what 
ever  she  might  be,  that  always  before  her  my  hat 
would  sweep  the  ground. 

When  a  man  does  not  feel  that  way,  he  has  no  feel 
ing  at  all.  One  might  say  he  is  callous. 

None  the  less  mystery  surrounded  her  and  I  won 
dered  if  I  had  the  right  to  probe  it.  She  had  been 
living  there,  across  the  hall,  beautiful  and  solitary  at 
night,  looking  like  a  princess  and  dressed  for  the  role 
and,  by  day,  associated  with  a  furniture  shop.  It  was 
not  only  incongruous,  it  was  curious.  It  suggested  that 
complexity  which  dual  personality  is,  and  yet  which  all 
problematic  natures  possess. 

In  considering  the  matter,  it  occurred  to  me  that 
while  I  had  no  right  to  lift  any  of  her  veils,  to  even 
touch  them  for  purposes  of  my  own,  yet,  for  Bradish's 
sake,  perhaps  I  should.  If  I  could  lead  him  up  to  her, 
the  shock  he  would  get  would  be  as  pronounced  as  the 


102  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

one  at  my  doorbell  and  far  more  effective,  for  definitely 
it  would  lay  that  ghost. 

I  reached  for  my  hat,  took  a  pair  of  gloves,  stuck 
a  stick  under  my  arm  and  went  down  the  stair. 

On  the  main  floor  was  the  den  of  the  janitor,  a  dirty, 
wild-hearted  little  man  with  a  hostile  and  drooping  eye. 
Long  since  I  had  tamed  him.  A  dollar  here,  a  cigar 
there,  and  he  had  become  a  watch  dog,  barking  that  I 
had  moved,  that  I  was  dead,  guarding  me  from  inter 
ruptions. 

"Tell  me,  pretty  maiden,"  I  said  when  I  got  at  him. 
"What  is  Miss  Bolton's  address?" 

He  did  not  know.  But  he  knew  her  place  of  busi 
ness.  It  was  a  furniture  store  on  Fortieth  Street  near 
Fifth  Avenue. 

In  an  hour  I  found  the  shop,  which  had  the  air  of  a 
Franco-Chinese  bazaar.  Among  other  curios  was  a 
chair  that  stretched  its  arms  to  me.  Pending  the  atten 
tions  of  a  clerk  with  shiny  hair  and  a  shiny  moustache, 
I  accepted  the  chair's  embraces.  At  the  moment,  the 
clerk  was  talking  to  a  woman,  a  topnotcher,  I  thought, 
Mrs.  Amsterdam  for  all  I  knew  to  the  contrary,  but 
presently  he  bowed  her  out  and  I  asked  for  Miss 
Bolton's  address. 

"Miss  Bolton?    Never  heard  of  her." 

"Here  is  her  picture  then.  A  beautiful  young 
woman,  beautifully  dressed,  who  speaks  with  a  foreign 
intonation.  She  is  connected  with  your  firm.  Where 
is  she?" 

"Oh,  yes!  I  recognise  the  picture.  But — er — she 
was  with  us  under  another  name." 

I  shifted.  "This  is  a  decent  chair.  Send  it  to  Mr. 
Bradish." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  103 

"Mr.  James  Bradish?" 

I  nodded. 

"Is  this  Mr.  Bradish?"  he  asked,  looking,  I  could 
see,  for  the  spider  of  which  all  New  York  was  aware. 

"No,  but  if  he  likes  the  chair,  I  will  pay  for  it." 

"Yes,  sir.    May  I  ask  your  name?" 

I  gave  it,  the  Buck  Club  with  it  "and  added,  "Well, 
where  is  the  lady?" 

He  smoothed  that  moustache.  "She — er — she  dis 
associated  herself  from  us  just  when  Mr.  Delatour  was 
sending  her  abroad.  I  believe  she  is  in  Montreal — or 
is  it  Toronto?" 

I  could  not  tell  him  and  he  went  back  among  tall 
bahuts,  silk  tapestries,  porcelain  monsters,  and  I  saw 
him  lean  over  a  table. 

Twelve  hours  away,  I  thought.    If  she  is  away! 

But  he  was  returning.  "I  don't  seem  to  find  it. 
Mr.  Delatour  may  know.  He  is  out  now,  I  will  ask 
him." 

I  got  up. 

He  saw  me  out.  "Yes,  sir,  it  will  be  attended  to  and 
the  chair  also." 

As  the  lift  took  me,  I  could  have  sworn  that  the 
lady  of  the  steps  was  Aly  Bolton.  From  the  start  I 
could  have  sworn  it  and  would  have  sworn  it,  sworn  it 
at  Bradish,  had  I  not  believed  she  was  in  Paris  and  I 
know  of  no  normal  process  whereby  a  young  woman 
can  be  in  two  places  at  once.  Or  any  normal  process 
either  whereby  she  can  have  two  names  and  no 
address. 

I  was  on  the  avenue  by  this  time,  looking  in  at  shops 
that  were  filled  with  things  I  did  not  want.  What  I 
did  want  was  a  bite.  I  made  for  Sherry's,  changed  my 


io4  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

mind,  boarded  a  bus  and  got  out  at  Bradish's  corner. 

In  the  hall  was  Peters  and  I  asked  him  to  get  me  a 
sandwich. 

"And  a  glass  of  Madeira,  sir." 

Already  Gedney  had  told  me  that  Bradish  was  in 
the  reception-room,  and  at  once,  as  I  entered  that 
chamber  of  horrors,  I  discovered  him  at  the  window, 
standing  there,  looking  out,  a  thing  which  a  gentleman 
never  does. 

He  turned  and  explained  it.  "I  am  on  the  watch 
now,  you  know." 

"Well,  you  need  not  be.     I  have  got  it." 

We  went  on  in  to  the  library  and  seating  myself  I 
added:  "Also  I  have  a  chair  for  you.  I  thought  it 
very  comfortable.  I  thought  it  more  than  comfort 
able.  It  was  what  you  might  call  a  Varsity  chair.  It 
was  highly  instructive." 

"You  have  heard  something." 

"Rather  a  long  story,  too.  But  perhaps  it  won't 
bore  you.  There  is  a  young  woman  hereabouts  who 
might  be— — " 

He  had  it  away  from  me  before  I  could  get  it  out. 

"Nelly's  twin.  She  is  employed  at  Delatour's. 
Nelly  told  me  about  her.  If  that  is  your  story,  what 
is  true  in  it  is  not  new." 

"But  look  here " 

"Oh,  I'm  looking  and  I  propose  to  keep  at  it.  Here 
are  your  sandwiches.  I  hope  they  will  seem  more  appe 
tising  to  you  than  that  story  has  to  me.  Did  you  think 
I  would  swallow  it?" 

Peters  had  put  a  tray  before  me  and  gone.  The 
sandwiches  went  quite  as  quickly. 

Smoking,  he  watched  me  and  puffed.     "Nelly  said 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  105 

the  resemblance  was  confined  to  the  profile  and  colour 
ing.  She  said  the  Delatour  girl  was  more  fragile  and 
slimmer.  I  remember  just  the  way  she  put  it,  'She's 
me  etherealised.'  ' 

"In  duodecimo,"  I  threw  out.  "Yes,  that's  true. 
None  the  less " 

"You  thought  I  could  mistake  one  for  the  other. 
Never." 

I  pushed  at  the  tray  and  he  sat  down  and  shoved 
a  box  at  me. 

"Have  a  cigar.    You  will  be  there  tomorrow?" 

"Yes,  and  the  day  after.  As  often  as  you  like.  But 
I  think  you  are  wrong.  I  think  it  was  the  Delatour 
girl,  as  you  call  her.  I  would  have  said  so  this  morn 
ing,  only  I  thought  her  in  Paris." 

"And  thought  me  insane." 

"Look  here,  Jim,  either  you  are  cracked  or  else  you 
saw  a  ghost.  There  are  no  two  ways  about  it." 

"But  you  are  ridiculous  with  your  ghost.  I  never 
heard  such  rot." 

"Ever  heard  of  Carlyle  then?  'Ghosts,'  the  old 
duffer  said,  'nigh  a  thousand  million  of  them  walk  the 
earth  at  noon.'  ' 

"Carlyle  was  capable  of  anything,  except  decent 
English.  He  never  saw  one  of  his  ghosts  or  you 
either." 

"It  is  a  pretty  question.  In  England  almost  every 
old  family  has  a  ghost.  A  ducal  family  has  two  ghosts. 
You  know  about  the  Crookes  menage,  don't  you?" 

"Who  the  deuce  is  Crookes?" 

"An  ordinary  person  who  discovered  thallium,  in 
vented  the  radiometer  and  foretold  the  x-ray." 

"The  chemist?" 


106  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"From  what  I  hear,  he  is  passionless  as  algebra. 
Now  he  said,  'I  do  not  say  such  things  may  be,  I  say 
such  things  are.'  ' 

"He  did  not  say  it  about  ghosts  then." 

uYou  are  quite  right.  He  said  it  about  a  spirit 
materialised  by  a  medium,  a  very  pretty  spirit,  a  spirit 
that  called  herself  Katie  King,  gave  him  her  photo 
graph,  a  lock  of  her  hair  and  sat  in  his  lap,  sat  in  it 
not  once,  but  a  hundred  times.  I  am  not  making  this 
up,  it  is  all  down  somewhere." 

"I  don't  believe  it" 

"Of  course  you  don't.  You  believe  in  the  reality 
of  things.  You  believe  there  is  heat,  you  believe  there 
is  cold.  There  is  neither  heat  nor  cold.  There  is  merely 
vibration  and  the  brain  to  translate  it.  You  believe 
there  is  light,  you  believe  there  is  colour.  There  is  no 
light,  there  are  no  colours.  There  is  only  matter  and 
motion  and  the  optic  nerve.  On  the  other  hand  you 
don't  believe  in  illusions.  Of  all  illusions  the  real  is 
the  greatest." 

"Here !  Help  yourself  to  the  Madeira  but  spare  me 
your  Fichte  and  brandy." 

"Very  good  then,  consider  the  lilies  of  the  field. 
They  toil  not,  neither  do  they  spin  and  you  have  seen 
them  in  their  ideal  condition.  But  you  have  not  heard 
them  grow  into  it.  That  is  because  your  ears  are  not 
attuned  to  their  vibrations.  If  they  were,  you  would 
precious  soon  discover  the  noise  they  make.  Because 
you  are  not  deaf,  you  don't  believe  it.  Because  you 
are  not  blind  you  believe  there  can  be  nothing  that  is 
not  obvious.  It  is  the  obvious  alone  that  is  illusory." 

"In  the  Park  today,  Nelly  was  perfectly  obvious, 
with  nothing  illusory  about  her." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  107 

"Except  when  she  vanished." 

"I  did  not  say  she  vanished.    I  said " 

"You  said  you  saw  her  one  minute  and  could  not 
see  her  the  next.  Isn't  that  what  you  told  me?" 

"Well,  yes,  but " 

"Look  here,  old  chap,  a  crustacean  extracts  from 
the  water  material  wherewith  to  make  a  shell.  From 
grain  a  bird  produces  feathers  and  an  elephant  pro 
duces  ivory.  These  processes  are  marvellous.  But 
they  are  so  common  that  we  accept  them  as  a  matter 
of  course.  Yet,  in  view  of  them,  it  is  quite  conceivable 
that  the  disincarnate  can  so  utilise  particles  and  ele 
ments  of  the  air  that  materialisation  ensues.  Mate 
rialisation  can  be  even  forced  upon  them.  The  dead 
can  be  raised.  It, is  true  it  takes  black  magic  to  do  it 
and  nowadays  who  believes  in  that  sort  of  thing?  I 
am  sure  I  did  not  until  occultism  taught  me  better. 
Given  certain  conditions  and  the  dead  can  be  raised. 
Given  others  and  they  can  raise  themselves.  There 
are  more  things  in  heaven  and  earth,  Jim  Bradish 
Horatio " 

"Beg  pardon,  sir." 

In  the  doorway  Gedney  stood  and  with  him  a  man 
and  that  chair  from  which  I  had  set  forth  to  tell 
Bradish  what  he  knew  beforehand.  It  was  a  mocking 
chair. 

But  now,  stretching  its  arms  at  Bradish,  he  too  let 
it  embrace  him. 

He  turned  to  me.  "Jolly  good.  Where  did  you 
find  it?" 

"At  Delatour's." 

He  turned  to  the  man.  "Tell  Delatour  if  he  has 
another  like  it  to  send  it  here." 


io8  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

In  a  moment,  when  the  man  had  gone,  he  turned 
again  to  me. 

"Very  nice  of  you,  I'm  sure.  Was  it  from  that  girl 
you  got  it?" 

"Lord,  no.    I  didn't  see  her." 

"How  did  you  know  then  about  the  resemblance?" 

"She  had  a  flat  across  the  way  from  mine." 

"At  your  confounded  walkup?" 

"Where  else?  I  am  not  maintaining  two  establish 
ments.  But  she  saw  you  there  once  and  said  you  had  a 
beautiful  nature.  She  was  entirely  wrong.  None  the 
less  you  might  cultivate  one." 

"I  think  I  am  cultivating  one.  I  have  accepted  your 
chair  with  gratitude  and  your  remarks  with  charity. 
What  more  would  you  have?" 

"Abandon  this  whole  thing.  If  you  are  not  cracked 
already  it  will  drive  you  crazy." 

"Beg  pardon,  sir." 

There  was  Gedney  again,  this  time  with  a  card  on  a 
salver. 

Bradish  looked  at  the  card,  looked  at  me. 

"A  man  with  some  leases.     They  won't  take  long." 

He  got  up  and  limped  into  the  chamber  of  horrors. 
On  the  table  beside  me  was  The  Dawn,  a  novel  by  Bil 
Sayers,  which  the  junior  member  of  the  house  that 
published  my  rubbish  told  me  had  sold  to  the  tune  of 
sixty  thousand  copies. 

Idly  I  opened  it.  Instantly  the  room  dissolved.  I 
was  wandering  afar  in  a  fancy  ball  of  the  imagination, 
one  in  which  I  felt  unworthy  to  tie  the  latchets  of  the 
writer's  shoes.  The  ball  he  gave  suggested  a  Baude- 
larian  masquerade  conducted  by  Gautier;  the  dual  sur 
prises  that  only  a  magician  of  letters  can  create;  the 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  109 

words  glued  to  the  idea  and  the  idea  a  winged  thing. 
With  the  name  of  a  prize  fighter,  Bil  Sayers  had  the 
pen  of  a  witch. 

But  the  room  reassembled  its  atoms.  Bradish  reap 
peared.  Yet  it  may  be  he  had  lingered  too  long  in  the 
chamber  of  horrors.  It  may  be  that  some  of  its 
atmosphere  had  permeated  him.  He  startled  me  with 
the  first  thing  he  said. 

"What  did  you  mean  by  saying  the  dead  can  be 
raised?" 

"Merely  that  and  nothing  more." 

"How  is  it  done?" 

"Only  the  initiate  know.  But  I  understand  that 
among  the  requisites  are  incantations,  chemicals  and 
buckets  of  blood." 

"And  the  dead  rise  from  the  buckets?" 

"With  the  blood  and  other  substances  the  spirit 
materialises." 

He  had  been  standing.  He  sat  down  in  the  chair  I 
had  given  him,  reached  for  the  book  I  had  put  on  the 
table,  fidgeted  with  it  and  shoved  it  back. 

"And  you  say  it  has  been  done?" 

"Read  your  ^Eschylus.  In  the  Persians  there  is  an 
account  reasonably  circumstantial  and  tolerably  terrific. 
Since  then,  there  have  been  a  number  of  instances.  Only 
the  other  day  I  saw  an  account  of  one  in  the  London 
Times.  It  told  of  a  seance  at  the  Winter  Palace 
where  a  Thibetan  lama  evoked  for  the  tsar  the  spirit 
of  Alexander  II." 

"His  grandfather?  The  chap  who  was  bombed? 
I  don't  believe  it." 

"How  admirable  you  are  today.    You  ask  for  infor- 


no  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

mation.  The  prettiest  girl  in  all  the  world  can  only- 
give  you  what  she's  got." 

But  there  was  Gedney  again.  Someone  else  had 
come  and  I  reached  for  my  hat. 

"Tomorrow  at  eleven?"  he  said  when  he  saw  I  was 
going. 

"On  the  dot." 


XV 

THE  next  morning  I  went  to  the  roof.  About  me 
were  fastidious  tokens,  the  subsurface  garments  of 
my  neighbours.  In  the  street  were  hurrying  insects. 
Above,  indifferent  to  the  idiot  agitations  of  man, 
serenely  the  sun  looked  down.  It  reminded  me  of 
Brahma,  who  knows  the  nothingness  of  all. 

But  the  sun,  that  is  a  divine  lecturer,  is  also  a 
heavenly  clock.  The  hour  of  my  rendezvous  with  the 
quick,  perhaps  also  with  the  dead,  was  approaching.  I 
threw  myself  down  the  stairs  and  ultimately  reached 
the  Park,  where  I  found  Bradish  gazing,  as  Janus 
gazed,  two  ways  at  once. 

Amicably  he  greeted  me.    "You  are  always  late." 

Inimically  I  answered  him.     "You  look  like  a  god." 

Bolstered  by  a  stone  pillar,  he  stood  at  the  top  of  a 

flight  of  steps.     Beneath  was  a  path  that  girdled  a 

miasmatic  lake.     The  path  was  punctuated  with  the 

exclamation  points  of  trees,  between  which,  at  spaced 

intervals,    were    arbours,    vine-covered,    filled    with 

mosquitoes.     At  the  foot  of  the  steps,  three  children 

shouted  as  only  American  children  do  shout.     Along 

the  path  a  man  strolled,  his  hands  behind  his  back, 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  in 

talking  to  himself.  Otherwise,  at  the  moment,  there 
was  no  one. 

Along  the  top  of  the  steps  were  nurses,  prams,  old 
women.  Beyond,  on  the  road,  were  cars,  victorias, 
girls  on  horseback.  Across  the  road,  more  trees. 

Bradish  looked  at  his  watch,  which  was  always 
wrong. 

"It's  eleven-thirty,"  he  informed  me.  "Now,"  he 
authoritatively  added,  "you  go  down  there." 

At  the  foot  of  the  steps,  I  gave  the  shoutmg  chil 
dren  a  quarter  and  invited  them  to  hasten  elsewhere 
in  search  of  lollypops,  of  which  I  hoped  they  would 
sicken  and  die.  At  once  the  man  who  had  been  talking 
to  himself  began  talking  at  me.  There  are  times 
when  if  I  cannot  answer  rudely,  I  do  not  answer  at  all. 
This  was  one  of  them.  The  shouting  children  had  got 
me  on  edge.  Besides  it  seemed  imbecile  to  stand  wait 
ing  for  someone  who  would  never  come,  for  something 
that  could  never  happen. 

I  lit  a  cigarette.  My  talkative  friend  had  moved  on. 
The  children  had  gone.  But  now,  at  the  right,  people 
appeared,  tourists  I  judged,  quite  a  lot  of  them,  talk 
ing  in  that  rasping  voice  which  is  one  of  my  beloved 
country's  many  specialties  and  dressed  in  a  fashion 
that  is  another.  I  looked  at  the  miasmatic  lake  in 
which  were  intrepid  ducks  and  suddenly  I  turned.  I 
had  heard  Bradish. 

At  the  top  of  the  steps,  his  limping  foot  may  have 
slipped.  I  could  see  him,  one  hand  on  the  balustrade, 
pulling  himself  up,  motioning  at  me  with  the  other. 
But  I  saw,  too,  something  else.  Descending  the  steps 
was  Nelly  Chilton — she,  or  her  ghost. 


ii2  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Dumbfounded,  I  gasped  but  I  rallied,  dropped  my 
cigarette,  raised  my  hat.  At  that  instant  she  was  mid 
way  on  the  steps  above  me.  Whether  or  not  she  saw 
me  I  could  not  tell.  She  ignored  me  as  only  an  entirely 
well-bred  woman  can  ignore  a  man  whom  she  does 
not  wish  to  notice. 

I  stared.  She  was  nearer  then  than  the  instant 
before  and,  in  staring,  I  was  conscious  of  three  distinct 
and  practically  simultaneous  impressions.  First,  that 
she  was  not  Nelly  Chilton  but  Aly  Bolton ;  second,  that 
she  was  neither  the  one  nor  the  other ;  third,  that  who 
ever  she  might  be,  she  was  livid. 

Confused  by  the  conflicting  impressions,  I  looked 
up  at  Bradish,  looked  without  consciously  seeing  him, 
looked  again  at  her,  for  her,  rather.  She  was  no 
longer  there.  During  the  shift  of  my  eyes  she  had 
vanished. 

The  tourists  then  were  directly  in  front  of  me.  One 
of  them,  a  man,  was  asking  me  something.  I  flung  him 
aside,  flung  myself  through  the  others,  flung  myself 
beyond  and  looked.  Not  a  trace !  On  the  other  side 
of  the  path  were  bushes.  No  onel  Nearby  was  an 
arbour.  Empty ! 

I  turned.  Bradish,  red  as  a  tomato,  was  limping 
along  the  path.  Behind  him  the  tourists,  bunched  to 
gether,  were  rasping  angrily  at  me.  I  was  sorry  to 
have  appeared  uncivil,  but  I  was  not  in  the  humour  to 
say  so.  I  had  my  hands  full  with  Bradish.  Without 
his  hat,  passing  and  repassing  a  hand  on  his  head,  his 
mouth  working,  that  spider  venomously  active,  before 
me  he  stood,  unable  to  speak,  congestioned  by 
emotion. 

"Come  here.'1 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  113 

I  got  him  in  the  arbour,  got  him  seated,  killed  a  few 
mosquitoes  and  asked  if  his  car  was  waiting.  I  do 
not  think  he  heard.  He  was  stuttering  something, 
what  I  could  not  make  out,  something  to  the  effect  that 
my  Nelly  was  dead. 

I  never  had  a  Nelly.  Otherwise  it  was  curious. 
Bradish,  six  feet  tall,  ordinarily  nerveless  as  a  stone 
wall,  was  shaking  like  a  frightened  girl. 

In  those  remote  days,  brandy  was  to  be  had  in  the 
Park  and  very  bad  brandy  it  was.  But  there  are  times 
and  seasons  when  bad  brandy  is  better  than  none. 
This  was  one  of  them.  I  thought,  My  kingdom  for  a 
pony!  His  house,  though,  was  very  neighbourly. 
Rather  than  the  hazards  of  sylvan  bars,  it  seemed  to 
me  safer  to  get  him  there. 

"See  here,"  I  said.  "If  you  came  on  foot,  we'll  find 
a  cab." 

Again  he  passed  a  hand  over  his  head.  "Where  is 
my  hat?" 

"Probably  on  the  steps." 

He  got  up.  I  put  a  hand  under  his  elbow.  He 
shook  it  off  and  limped  along. 

The  tourists  then  had  gone.  The  children  I  had 
hoped  were  dead  had  returned,  dirtier,  noisier,  not 
sick  but  sticky.  They  were  having  a  rough  and  tumble 
on  the  steps,  from  the  top  of  which,  Fletcher,  who  had 
succeeded  Mike,  was  looking  down. 

By  this  time  Bradish  had  himself  in  hand.  In  the 
car  he  said  nothing  but  at  his  house  he  distributed 
various  orders. 

"Except  to  Dr.  Cally  I  am  not  at  home." 

"Yes,  sir.    Thank  you,  sir." 


n4  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Something  to  eat  and  drink  in  the  library.  Any 
thing." 

"Brandy,"  I  threw  in. 

"And  curagoa,"  Bradish  added. 

Brandy  and  curacoa  make  very  good  medicine.  I 
applauded  the  prescription.  Apart  from  which,  I 
have  often  wondered  how  it  was  that  in  questioning 
his  sanity,  I  did  not  question  my  own.  For  presently, 
after  his  servants  had  come  and  gone,  and  we  had  both 
dosed  ourselves  and  he  went  back  into  it,  I  followed 
his  lead,  not  head  over  heels  perhaps,  but  with  rela 
tive  confidence. 

The  lead  he  gave  was,  at  first,  merely  an  indication. 

"Well,  what  do  you  make  of  it?" 

"I  don't  know  what  to  make  of  it,  except  that  who 
ever  the  lady  of  the  steps  may  have  been,  neither  of 
us  ever  saw  her  before." 

He  lit  a  cigar,  puffed  at  it,  lit  it  again. 

"You  are  right.  Neither  of  us  has  seen  a  ghost. 
Yesterday  when  you  spoke  of  one,  I  thought  it  ridicu 
lous.  I  did  not  believe  it  possible.  I  do  now,  though. 
No,  I  still  do  not  believe  it  possible  and  yet  I  have 
to  believe  it.  My  eyes  deny  what  my  ears  affirm." 

I  exclaimed  at  him.  "Your  ears!  What  have  your 
ears  to  do  with  it?" 

He  was  relighting  his  cigar  and  I  doubled  on  him. 
"Look  here!  What  in  the  world  did  you  go  and 
tumble  over  for?" 

"It  was  her  doing." 

"How  her  doing?  You  don't  mean  she  knocked 
you  down?" 

"In  that  beastly  hole  where  we  sat,  I  told  you  about 
it.  You  seemed  more  interested  in  the  mosquitoes." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  115 

"Tell  me  again  then." 

"She  was  almost  on  me  when  I  saw  her.  That  was 
just  before  you  did  the  football  work  through  those 
people.  To  tell  you  the  honest  truth  I  did  not  expect 
to  see  her.  I  hoped  I  might.  I  did  not  believe  I 
would.  When  she  came  on  me,  like  that,  I  started, 
and  she  did,  too.  Yesterday,  I  don't  think  she  saw 
me.  But,  today,  when  she  did  see  me,  she  gave  a  sort 
of  start  and  I  was  so  overcome  I  out  with  something, 
'Nelly!'  or,  'My  Nelly!'  and  tried  to  touch  her.  I 
know  I  stretched  my  hand  toward  her.  She  edged 
away,  drew  her  head  back  and  said,  and  said  it  from 
the  tips  of  her  lips,  but  as  plainly  as  I  am  talking  to 
you,  'Your  Nelly  is  dead.'  You  remember  how  she 
used  to  look.  She  had  a  skin  of  cream  with  claret  in 
it.  At  that  instant  she  looked  as  though  she  did  not 
have  a  drop  of  blood.  I  started  again  to  approach 
her.  Already  she  was  hurrying  down  the  steps.  I 
slipped  on  a  bit  of  orange  peel  and  called  to  you." 

It  was  rather  rattling.  To  clarify  it,  I  said,  "You 
are  sure  she  spoke?" 

"There  is  no  question  about  it.  When  I  said 
'Nelly!'  or  'My  Nelly!'  she  said,  and  said  it  as  though 
she  were  annoyed,  'Your  Nelly  is  dead.' ' 

"The  devil!" 

At  the  moment  I  found  but  that.  Yet  immediately 
I  had  it,  or  thought  I  had  it,  and  I  gave  it  to  him. 

"In  that  arbour,  it  occurred  to  me  that  when  I  went 
through  those  people  and  was  headed  one  way,  she 
had  already  taken  the  other." 

"Supposing  she  had.    I  don't  see  how  it  matters." 

"If  what  you  tell  me  is  true,  I  mean  if  you  did 
not  imagine  it,  it  matters  everything.  What  you  saw 


n6  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

and  I  saw  was  not  a  ghost.  Ghosts  may  or  may  not 
appear,  but,  assuming  they  do  appear,  they  don't  talk. 
They  cannot.  The  physical  organs  are  lacking." 

I  could  see  him  turning  it  over.  Then  he,  too,  had 
it,  or  thought  he  had  it,  and  he  gave  it  to  me. 

"Hold  on!  You  told  me  that  the  spirit  that  sat  in 
Crookes'  lap  said  her  name  was  Katie  King.  She 
must  have  talked  to  tell  it." 

"Yes,  and  for  that  matter  I  have  had  a  spirit  talk 
to  me.  In  Boston,  at  a  seance,  a  spirit  bobbed  up  right 
in  front  of  me.  As  she  was  young  and  pretty,  or  at 
least  seemed  so  in  the  darkened  room,  I  put  an  arm 
around  her  and  she  bleated,  'Don't,  don't!'  and  cuddled 
closer.  While  I  was  hugging  her,  the  medium  barked 
like  a  bulldog,  'Young  man !  Don't  you  take  liberties 
with  Bright  Eyes.'  Then  Miss  Bright  Eyes  slipped 
from  my  arms  and  disaggregated  through  the  floor." 

I  laughed  as  I  said  it,  as  one  does  in  telling  a  thing 
of  that  sort,  but  it  did  not  amuse  Bradish.  Gloomily 
he  smoked  and  I  gave  the  story  its  proper  perspective. 

"But  look  here,  Bright  Eyes  and  Katie  King  and 
any  other  mediumistically  materialised  spirit  is  not  a 
ghost.  A  spirit  is  a  physical  exteriorisation  of  the 
medium's  psychism.  Apart  from  the  medium,  it  has 
no  existence  whatever.  On  the  other  hand,  a  ghost, 
the  old-fashioned  ghost,  had  its  own  entity,  its  own 
volition.  Like  the  wind,  it  came  and  went  as  it  listed. 
But,  except  in  novels,  it  never  talked.  How  could  it?" 

Bradish  got  up  and  stamped  about.  An  old  trick 
of  his,  it  had  always  annoyed  me.  But  on  this  day, 
occupied  as  I  was  with  what  a  German  would  call  the 
being  and  the  non-being,  nothing  mattered  except  the 
key  to  the  riddle  which  had  complicated  itself  by 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  117 

becoming  a  problem  with  an  enigma  added.  The  lady 
of  the  steps  constituted  the  problem.  Was  she  or  was 
she  not  a  ghost?  In  either  case,  who  was  she?  In  the 
latter  query  was  the  enigma. 

The  practically  simultaneous  impressions  that  I  had 
derived  from  her,  vividly  confusing  as  they  were  at 
the  moment,  had  since  become  less  distinct.  Of  them 
all  the  third,  being  the  last,  was  the  strongest  and  I 
told  myself  that  while  the  apparition  might  impossibly 
be  Nellie  Chilton,  might  possibly  have  been  Aly  Bolton, 
more  probably  it  was  a  fair  unknown. 

Yet,  in  that  event,  why  had  she  said  that  Nelly  was 
dead?  How,  for  that  matter  had  she  come  to  say  it? 
Above  all  why  the  de  haut  en  bas  attitude?  Assuming 
it  were  Nelly  Chilton,  assuming  it  were  Aly  Bolton, 
assuming  it  were  a  third  and  unknown  quantity,  what 
had  Bradish  done  to  be  spoken  to  with  such  loftiness? 
He  was  a  good  sort  and  his  attitude  to  the  departed 
had  been  impeccable.  Why  then  the  air  of  saying,  Vil 
lain,  unhand  me? 

At  that,  quite  like  the  mosquitoes  on  the  lake,  an 
idea  hummed  and  bit. 

I  looked  up  at  Bradish. 

"Jim,  would  you  mind  continuing  your  promenade 
sitting  down?  I  have  something  to  ask  you." 

He  turned  to  me.     "Well,  what?" 

"You  remember  the  ladylike  dressmaker  with  the 
cheque.  What  did  you  tell  them  at  the  manor  about 
him?" 

It  was  a  bit  far  away.  It  took  him  a  moment  to 
get  there.  In  the  process  he  sat  down. 

"I  don't  see  why  you  want  to  go  back  into  that. 
But  if  it  is  any  benefit  to  you,  I  got  Mrs.  Chilton  alone 


n8  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

and  put  the  matter  before  her.  She  took  it  to  Nelly. 
When  she  returned  she  said  Nelly  would  marry  me." 

"So  I  assumed.  But  just  what  did  you  tell  Mrs. 
Chilton?" 

"What  Peters  told  me,  that  he  had  gone  with  you 
to  Bonheur  and  that  the  scoundrel  would  not  budge." 

At  that,  I  too  got  up  and  stamped  about.  I  stamped 
the  harder  because  I  did  not  know  what  to  say.  Truth 
should  be  agreeable  or  else  withheld.  To  have  told 
him  that  Nelly  Chilton  had  agreed  to  marry  him  solely 
because  of  circumstances  which  she  was  distressingly 
unaware  no  longer  existed  or  which,  if  they  had  ever 
existed,  existed  only  in  her  mother's  imagination,  to 
have  told  him  that  would  have  been  tantamount  to 
hitting  him  over  the  head. 

"Well,  why  do  you  ask?"  I  heard  him  say. 

I  stopped  and  turned.     "Oh,  nothing." 

"Nothing,  eh?  Then  you  have  a  mighty  queer  way 
of  asking  mighty  queer  questions  about  it." 

I  had  turned  away,  I  turned  again.  "The  whole 
thing  is  queer.  I  am  trying  to  get  the  rights  of  it. 
From  the  manner  in  which  the  lady  of  the  steps  spoke 
to  you,  it  seems  to  me  that  she  must  have  felt  herself 
aggrieved." 

"About  what,  in  God's  name?" 

"She  may  have  got  the  idea  that  the  Bonheur  story 
was  too  bad  to  be  true." 

"But  where  could  she  have  got  such  an  idea?" 

"Ah,  where!     That's  it." 

"And  from  whom?" 

"From  whom,  as  you  say." 

"Well,  then?" 

"I  do  not  know  where  she  got  it,  how  she  got  it  or 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  119 

what  she  got,  but  from  your  account  she  appears  to 
have,  or  appears  to  think  she  has,  a  grievance  against 
you,  if  not  about  Bonheur,  then  about  somebody  or 
something  else." 

I  sat  down  and  he  got  up. 

"I  believe  you  are  right." 

But  there  now  at  the  door  was  Peters. 

"Dr.  Cally,  sir." 

In  he  walked,  the  living  image  of  the  devil,  and 
pointed  a  finger  at  Bradish. 

"You're  exciting  yourself,  my  son.  None  of  that  I 
told  you." 

He  nodded  at  me.     "What's  new  on  Parnassus?" 

I  got  up  to  go.  "What's  new  with  you?  Any  inter 
esting  cases?" 

Cally  plucked  at  his  beard.  "My  cases  are  all  inter 
esting — to  the  patients.  But  recently  I  had  one  that 
might  interest*  a  genius.  George  Eliot  had  a  similar 
case  in  one  of  her  novels.  You,  of  course,  could 
handle  it  better,  much  better.  You  have,  what  she 
lacked,  the  impressionist  touch." 

I  knew  he  was  guying  me.  None  the  less  I  walked 
straight  into  it. 

"What  sort  of  a  case?" 

Blandly  he  smiled.  "Hard  up  for  a  plot?  Well, 
some  day  I  may  give  you  one.  But  not  now.  Now 
I  have  to  scold  this  young  man.  He  seems  in  a  very 
depleted  condition.  Been  exchanging  ideas  with  you, 
hasn't  he?" 

"Hardly  that,"  I  said,  making  for  the  door  and 
smiling  at  him  as  I  went.  "Merely  a  tip  or  two.  I  was 
suggesting  another  physician." 


120  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

XVI 

IN  the  workshop  that  night  I  tried  to  solve  the 
riddle.  The  enigma  passed  and  repassed.  It  galloped 
like  Flaubert's  sphinx. 

J'ai  vu  le  sphinx  qui  fuyait.    II  galopait  comme  un  chacal. 

In  meditating  that  picture,  a  message  reached  me. 
Probably  the  result  of  what  people  who  like  fine  words 
call  unconscious  cerebration,  or  of  what  people  who 
like  finer  ones  call  inspiration,  none  the  less  the  mes 
sage  seemed  to  originate  not  from  within  but  from 
without.  It  seemed  as  though  an  invisible  presence 
had  conveyed  it.  Even  now,  though  years  have  gone 
by  since  then,  I  am  unable  to  say  that  it  was  not  due 
to  an  external  agency.  The  superjective,  always  poten 
tial  in  us,  though  in  most  of  us  usually  dormant,  may 
have  transmitted  it  from  one  of  the  unseen  helpers  that 
we  all  have  and  who  are  most  active  in  our  behalf 
when  we  are  striving,  not  for  ourselves,  but  for  others. 

In  any  event  and  however  the  impact  may  have 
originated,  eventually  it  supplied  the  key  to  the  riddle, 
opened  that  door  and  changed  three  lives.  The  com 
plex  result  was  not  immediate  and  in  time  much,  if 
not  all  of  it,  would  in  any  case  have  been  achieved. 
Sooner  or  later  all  doors  open,  all  lives  change.  But 
I  believe  now  that  the  key  was  hidden  in  the  message 
which,  simple  enough  on  the  surface,  told  me  to  do 
what  I  had  then  no  intention  whatever  of  doing  and 
that  was  to  visit  the  Park  the  next  day. 

Chateaubriand,  who  knew  what  poetry  is,  said  there 
are  apparitions  that  visit  the  heart  of  man.  They 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  121 

come,  as  thieves  and  angels  do,  and  like  them  depart. 
An  apparition  had  visited  me.  It  instructed  and  I 
obeyed.  On  the  morrow,  at  eleven-thirty,  I  was  again 
in  the  Park,  at  the  foot  of  those  steps. 

I  had  no  plan  of  any  kind,  which  often  is  the  best 
plan  of  all.  I  had  thought  that  when — and  if — the 
lady  appeared,  I  would  let  circumstances  guide  me. 
But  though  I  had  not  planned  what  I  would  do,  I  had 
planned  what  I  would  not  do.  The  day  before  she 
had  cut  me  dead.  Ghost  or  not,  I  did  not  propose  to 
have  her  cut  me  living.  If,  graciously,  she  were  so 
inclined  and  bowed,  my  hat  would  sweep  the  steps,  and 
if  by  look  or  motion  she  intimated  that  I  might  address 
her,  then,  while  I  had  no  phrases  rehearsed,  I  did  think 
I  might  become  quite  talkative  and  not  about  the 
weather,  either. 

Meanwhile,  on  the  third  step  from  the  bottom,  I 
sat  down.  The  dear  children  of  the  day  before  may 
have  sickened  at  last.  The  tourists  may  have  thought 
the  Park  a  haunt  of  thugs.  The  talkative  man  who 
talked  to  himself,  must  have  been  talking  elsewhere. 
Save  for  the  mosquitoes  I  was  alone.  Beyond,  on 
the  miasmatic  lake,  a  boat  floated.  Above  was  a 
tender  turquoise  and  the  indifferent  sun.  Of  the  lady, 
not  a  sign. 

I  lit  a  cigarette.  As  I  tossed  the  match,  my  hand 
stung.  From  it  fell  a  pebble.  I  looked  up.  At  the 
top  of  the  steps,  Bradish  was  looking  down.  Then  at 
once,  as  though  he  had  no  time  to  waste,  he  turned 
his  back,  a  very  fine  back,  draped  beautifully  in  beauti 
ful  flannels. 

I  called  at  him.    "Au  large,  canaille." 


122  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Still  that  back  and  I  fancied  he  was  gazing  Janus- 
esquely  as  he  had  gazed  the  day  before. 

Up  the  steps,  like  a  chamois  on  Chamonix,  I  flew. 

"See  here,  confound  it,  you  will  only  make  a  mess  of 
things  as  you  did  yesterday,  whereas  I " 

"You  will  do  wonders." 

"At  all  events,  I  won't  lose  my  head  and  my  hat 
and  tumble  over  backward.  If  she  sees  you,  she'll 
bolt,  godlike  that  you  are.  But  me,  now,  she  may  not 
notice  and  I  can  tiptoe  along  and  see  what  becomes  of 
her.  It  is  not  supposable  that  she  will  dematerialise 
as  little  Bright  Eyes  did  when  her  chaperon  caught  me 
hugging  her." 

"You  never  can  tell.  She  dematerialised  yesterday. 
She  dematerialised  the  day  before." 

"But  neither  of  us  saw  her  at  it.  Now  I  saw  Bright 
Eyes  perform  her  little  act.  She  sank  from  my  arms 
through  the  floor,  disaggregating  as  she  went." 

"She  was  a  fool  not  to  have  disaggregated  sooner." 

"I  dare  say.  But  that's  not  the  point.  If  you  are  to 
stop  here,  I'll  go.  If  you  go,  I'll  hold  the  fort." 

Bradish  grabbed  me  by  the  arm.  "There  she  is 
now!  In  that  taxi!" 

In  the  cab,  almost  in  front  of  us  then,  I  could  see 
her,  see  too  that  she  was  bowing,  not  at  both  of  us, 
not  at  Bradish,  that  bow  was  for  me,  and  raising  my 
stick  in  signal  at  the  mechanician  I  bounded.  Before 
I  could  reach  her  she  too  may  have  signalled.  A  yard 
or  two  beyond  the  cab  stopped,  a  gloved  hand  was 
held  out  to  me  and  my  eyes  were  eating  her  face. 

"Well!"  I  exclaimed.  "Of  all  people!  You  are 
not  the  ghost  of  yourself,  are  you?" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  123 

She  smiled.  "No.  I  don't  think  so.  Yet  I  may 
be.  One  never  knows." 

"But " 

The  smile  persisted.     "You  thought  me  abroad?" 

"And  heard  you  were  not." 

The  smile  passed.  She  was  no  longer  looking  at 
me,  but  over  me,  and  I  felt  a  kick.  I  knew  it  was  he, 
confound  him,  and  half  turning,  I  said : 

"This  is  Mr.  Bradish,  Miss  Bolton." 

I  had  seen  him  in  any  number  of  situations,  but  I 
had  never  seen  him  awkward  before.  Shy,  yes,  and 
diffident  also,  but  awkward  never,  yet  there  he  stood, 
fiddling  with  his  hat,  his  mouth  twitching  like  an 
embarrassed  schoolboy. 

The  smile  returned.  "How  do  you  do,  Mr. 
Bradish?" 

He  sort  of  gasped,  but  he  let  go.  "Thank  you, 
thank  you.  Had  the  pleasure  of  seeing  you  here  yes 
terday,  I  believe.  Yesterday  and  the  day  before." 

I  suppose  she  knew  what  he  was  thinking.  She 
usually  could  tell  what  anyone  thought,  that  is  when 
she  wanted  to,  but  she  took  it  very  simply. 

"Yesterday  and  the  day  before  I  was  in  Canada. 
I  am  on  my  way  now  from  the  station." 

She  turned  to  me.  "When  you  can  you  must  look 
in  at  my  new  quarters.  Signor  Matouchi  will  be  glad 
to  see  you — and  you  also,  Mr.  Bradish,  should  you 
care  to  come.  Will  you  tell  the  man  to  drive  on?" 

Another  smile  and  she  drew  back.  But  I  poked  my 
head  in  at  her. 

"My  love  to  your  angel  and  say  I  don't  know  where 
he  lives." 

She  laughed  and  told  me.    It  was  on  the  west  side 


i24  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

in  the  upper  Eighties.  As  she  told  me,  I  saw  travelling 
bags  at  her  feet.  She  gave  me  her  hand.  I  told  the 
driver  and  fell  back. 

Bradish,  his  hat  in  his  hand,  his  tail  between  his  legs, 
was  ambling  away. 

I  caught  up  with  him.  "Well,  sir,  I  hope  you  are 
satisfied.  That  ghost  is  laid." 

With  latent  ferocity  he  turned  on  me.  "Was  that 
the  Delatour  girl?  She  doesn't  resemble  Nelly  in  the 
least." 

"She  doesn't,  eh?  After  your  telling  her  you  saw 
her  here  yesterday  and  the  day  before!  I  like  that!" 

"I  don't  know  that  I  particularly  care  what  you  like 
or  what  you  don't  like.  At  a  distance  there  is  a  resem 
blance,  I  admit  that.  But  the  voice  is  different.  This 
girl  has  a  foreign  intonation,  a  foreign  look.  Viennese, 
I  should  say.  I  did  not  notice  that  until  she  spoke. 
Then  at  once  the  slight  resemblance  faded.  It  was 
not  she  who  said  to  me  yesterday,  'Your  Nelly  is 
dead.'  " 

"It  was  not  you  either,  I  suppose,  who  grabbed  me 
by  the  arm  and  said,  'There  she  is  I  There  she  is !'  ' 

"I  made  a  mistake,  that's  all  there  is  to  it.  You 
needn't  rub  it  in.  Come  on  to  the  house  and  have 
luncheon." 

Mentally,  again  I  threw  up  the  sponge.  In  trying  to 
unravel  it  the  night  before,  I  found  that  I  did  not 
believe  that  the  lady  on  the  steps  had  spoken  to  him. 
I  believed  that  self-suggestioned,  he  had  imagined  that 
she  had.  Other  people  have  had  auditory  hallucina 
tions,  and  why  not  he  ?  Why  not  he,  particularly  ?  He 
was  just  in  a  condition  for  them.  In  any  event  one 
thing  now  was  certain  and,  in  a  matter  such  as  this, 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  125 

one  was  a  great  many.  The  lady  of  the  steps  was  not 
Aly  Bolton.  Definitely  she  was  eliminated.  I  was 
free  to  pick  and  choose  between  a  dead  girl  and  a  dame 
inconnue  and  of  the  two  I  infinitely  preferred  the  latter. 
At  the  same  time,  it  struck  me  that  in  a  town  as  beauty- 
lorn  as  Manhattan  the  coincidence  of  three  young 
women  identical  in  beauty  was  fabulous.  Of  the  three 
one  had  now  dropped  out.  The  wonder  remained. 
The  subtraction  diminished  it  by  not  more  than  a  jot. 

I  looked  at  Bradish.    "What  did  Cally  say?" 

"About  what?" 

"The  condition  of  affairs  in  Peru." 

He  scowled.     "You  are  always  trying  to  be  funny." 

I  laughed.  "How  splendid  it  is  for  you  not  even 
to  have  to  try!  Come  now,  out  with  it.  What  did 
he  say?" 

"He  did  not  say  anything.  He  had  no  chance.  I 
did  not  tell  him.  If  I  had,  he  would  have  wanted  to 
have  me  committed." 

As  he  said  that,  he  nodded  at  me  and  I  nodded 
back. 

"I  am  not  so  sure  but  that  we  both  of  us  ought  to 
be.  Here  we  have  been,  two  days  running,  hunting 
a  ghost  at  high  noon  and  in  this  beastly  Park  of  all 
places.  Not  Cally  alone,  but  anyone  else  would  think 
we  were  cracked." 

"Speak  for  yourself.  What  Cally  did  say  is  that 
I  ought  to  get  out  of  here." 

I  ran  up  the  flag.  "Granada,  Sevilla,  Cadiz !  Can't 
you  hear  the  castagnettes,  the  clinking  heels,  the 
guitars  and  the  shouts?  Can't  you  smell  the  orange- 
trees  and  the  blood?  Can't  you  see  the  flash  of  the 
rapier,  the  bull  on  his  knees  and  the  whole  plaza  yell- 


126  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

ing  like  mad?  The  Lord  have  mercy  upon  us !  There 
people  spend  their  coppers  and  live.  Here  they  grub 
for  them  and  die." 

He  turned  on  me.  "All  that  is  copy.  You  know 
you  don't  care  a  rap  for  any  of  it  and  you  know,  too, 
and  jolly  well,  that  I  don't  either." 

We  had  reached  the  avenue.  Just  beyond,  a  man 
was  scaling  a  bus.  I  did  not  know  him,  but  he  re 
minded  me  of  Austen.  I  thought  of  the  street  of 
obscure  calamities  in  which  he  had  buttonholed  me. 
As  I  remembered  it,  it  was  somewhere  off  there  to  the 
east  and  I  asked  Bradish  if  he  knew  where  he  lived. 

Bradish  gestured  vaguely.  "He  left  a  card  for  me. 
Very  civil  of  him,  I  thought." 

We  lunched  like  imitation  barons  in  the  pseudo- 
baronial  hall.  But  Bradish  played  with  the  food.  He 
had  a  headache,  he  said,  and  I  never  heard  him  say 
such  a  thing  before. 

Afterward,  in  the  library,  I  caught  him  gazing  at 
me  with  pensive  malignancy. 

"What  did  you  have  in  your  head  yesterday  when 
you  brought  up  that  Bonheur  business?" 

At  the  moment  I  had  forgotten  just  what  had  sug 
gested  it  and  I  told  him  so. 

"I  will  refresh  your  memory  then.  You  intimated 
that  Nelly  might  have  misconstrued  it.  What  the 
devil  did  you  mean?" 

"Oh,  nothing  in  particular." 

I  was  wriggling.    He  saw  it  and  pinned  me  down. 

"I  wish  you  would  tell  me." 

A  good  straight  honest  lie  has  saved  many  a  situa 
tion.  But,  at  the  moment,  my  imagination  was  indi- 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  127 

gent.  I  could  not  think  of  one  and  though  I  regretted 
it  later,  I  told  the  truth. 

"Well,  then,  since  you  will  have  it,  you  were  a  bit 
precipitate." 

"How?" 

"I  lied  like  a  thief  to  Bonheur.  I  told  him  I  had 
seen  him  in  the  dock,  told  him  I  had  seen  you  sign 
that  cheque.  Then  I  shook  the  stripes  and  handcuffs 
at  him.  When  I  got  through,  he  was  a  wet  rag." 

Bradish  bit  his  lip,  but  clutching  back  at  his  own 
version,  he  brought  it  out. 

"Peters  said  he  would  not  budge." 

"Peters  was  only  in  there  for  a  moment.  He 
marched  in  and  threatened  to  knock  Bonheur's  head 
off.  I  sent  him  out  again.  Afterward  I  rather  feared 
he  might  have  got  it  wrong  and  I  sat  about  forever 
expecting  you  would  telephone.  You  didn't,  but 
then " 

"But  then  what?" 

"Afterward  I  thought  it  all  bunkum." 

He  roared  it.     "Bunkum!     What  do  you  mean?" 

I  looked  him  over.  "See  here,  I  have  no  desire  to 
defame  any  woman,  least  of  all  your  mother-in-law. 
But  I'll  wager  what  you  like  that  she  gave  Bonheur 
that  cheque — which  she  knew  you  would  honour — just 
to  pave  the  way  for  her  to  come  here  and  throw  a 
scare  in  you.  That  day  Austen  buttonholed  me.  I 
told  you  about  it.  He  said  she  would  jockey  her  daugh 
ter  into  marrying  you.  Well,  she  did.  She  jockeyed 
her,  jockeyed  you  and  that's  the  long  and  short  of  it." 

He  passed  his  hand  over  his  forehead,  got  up,  limped 
into  the  chamber  of  horrors  and  back  again,  while  I 
threshed  around  for  a  palliative.  I  did  not  find  any, 


128  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

or  what  I  did  find  seemed  very  futile.  Yet  what  is 
there  in  life  that  is  not  futile?  As  for  this  thing,  I 
knew  that  by  day  he  could  rid  himself  of  it.  Through 
mere  determination,  one  can,  by  day,  rid  the  mind  of 
anything.  But,  at  night,  I  knew  it  would  take  him 
unawares,  pull  at  his  sleeve,  wake  him,  sit  there 
and  stare. 

"She  has  got  to  know.  She  has  got  to  be  told  that  I 
knew  nothing  of  it." 

He  had  stopped  limping  about  and  was  standing  in 
front  of  me,  the  spider  pulsating  as  I  had  never  seen 
it  pulsate  before.  In  standing  he  sort  of  shook,  as 
one  does  with  the  ague. 

"I  don't  know  how  I  can  get  her  to  know.  In  the 
Park,  if  I  see  her  again,  she  may  refuse  to  listen. 
I " 

He  broke  off,  sat  down  and  got  up  again.  "I'll 
import  a  lama,  hang  me  if  I  don't." 

I  could  not  make  head  or  tail  of  it.  Perhaps  he 
saw  that  I  could  not  for  he  waved  and  added : 

"You  told  me  of  a  Thibetan  lama  that  raised  the 
dead." 

"Lord  of  Eternity!"  I  helplessly  exclaimed.  "No 
doubt  I  did.  I  am  capable  of  retailing  any  insanity. 
But  a  lama  is  not  a  prize-pig.  You  couldn't  import 
one.  Besides " 

"You  said,"  he  cut  in,  "that  there  had  been  any 
number  of  instances.  Other  means  failing,  there 
shall  be  one  here." 

I  sat  back.  It  seemed  phantasmagoric.  But  what 
else  had  the  episode  on  the  steps  been?  Perhaps  where 
all  is  abnormal,  the  abnormal  ceases.  Yet  the  ab 
normal  need  not  be  the  illicit  and  I  said  as  much. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  129 

'That  way  leads  to  Bedlam." 

He  laughed.  His  laughter  was  that  which  a  poet 
catalogued  as  heard  in  hell,  far  down. 

"Where  else  have  I  been  since  I  woke  up  at  the 
manor  and  saw  that  woman  looking  at  me?  As  soon 
as  I  knew  about  Nelly,  I  wished  I  had  gone  with  her. 
I  have  wished  it  a  hundred  times.  I  wish  it  now." 

He  sat  down.  "I  suppose  it  is  indecent  of  me  to 
say  so.  It  is  always  indecent  to  say  how  one  feels. 
But,  unless  I  find  a  way  out  of  this " 

"Well,  you  will,"  I  interrupted.  "I  have  told  you 
that.  You  are  standing  before  a  door  that  is  closed, 
bolted,  barred,  sealed  and  walled.  There  are  just  two 
things  than  can  efface  it — time  and  silence." 

Sotto  voce  I  added:  "And  some  one  to  beguile  them 
both." 

Angrily  he  protested.  "Save  that  for  your  novels. 
Ten  years  hence,  time  and  silence  might  help  and  would 
help  now,  I  suppose,  if  all  this  had  happened  ten  years 
ago.  But  today,  tomorrow,  the  day  after!  Not  for 


an  instant." 


"See  here,  if  you  don't  mind,  I'll  ask  some  of  your 
people  to  fetch  me  a  drink." 

I  did  not  want  it.  To  fuddle  in  the  daytime  has 
always  seemed  to  me  the  act  of  a  barbarian  or  else 
of  a  fool.  But  liquor,  which  excites  most  men,  was  a 
sedative  to  Bradish  and  I  thought  that  under  its  influ 
ence,  his  mood  might  change,  veer  and  pass. 

He  was  one  too  many  for  me. 

"Stop  on  here  and  get  as  squiffy  as  you  like.  My 
head  aches  to  split.  I  am  off  to  bed." 

He  was  going,  but  he  stopped,  turned,  pointed. 

"That  door  you  know — the  door  bolted,  barred, 
sealed,  walled — I'll  break  it  down." 


130  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

XVII 

IT  seemed  very  unnatural  of  Bradish  to  have  a  head 
ache.  Unnatural  too  was  his  irritability.  In  my  igno 
rance,  the  combination  seemed  to  me  symptomatic  of 
approaching  derangement  and  so  weighed  on  me  that 
that  night  I  awoke  calling  for  help.  I  had  had  a 
frightful  dream  about  Switzerland. 

It  passed  as  such  things  do  pass  and  that  afternoon 
I  went  to  the  address  which  Aly  Bolton  had  supplied. 

By  comparison  with  the  walkup,  the  house  was  noble. 
A  lift  exalted  me  and  presently  a  moonfaced  maid 
conducted  me  to  a  sitting-room  that  was  charming. 

"Rather  a  change  from  Harlem,"  I  said  when  the 
maid's  mistress  appeared. 

She  had  come  into  a  little  money,  she  told  me.  In 
telling  it,  she  gave  me  her  hand  and,  indicating  an 
oblong  silver  box  that  sat  on  a  table,  offered  me  a 
cigarette.  But  though  she  smiled,  as  I  think  she  alone 
could  smile,  she  had  the  languid  air  of  those  who  are 
a  bit  overworked. 

"And  now  tell  me  about  yourself,"  she  added. 

I  was  admiring  her  frock.  It  was  delicious  and  she 
was  delicious  in  it.  The  combined  delights  sang 
about  me. 

"You  may  perhaps  remember  my  ghost  story." 

"You  have  been  writing  it?" 

"I  have  been  living  it.  In  the  second  chapter  you 
walked  in." 

She  was  looking  at  me,  reading  me,  I  thought,  but 
even  for  her  clear  eyes  I  felt  that  that  second  chapter 
was  too  involved  and  I  shook  it  out  for  her  after  sum 
marising  the  first. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  131 

In  turn  she  summed  it.  "The  lady  of  the  steps  you 
took  first  for  Nelly  Chilton,  then  for  me,  then  for  a 
stranger,  after  which  she  vanished,  though  not  until 
she  had  told  poor  Mr.  Bradish  that  his  Nelly  was 
dead.  But  what  better  ghost  story  would  you  have?" 

"Personally  I  cannot  improve  it.  But  you  might. 
Since  yesterday  I  have  been  hoping  you  would.  The 
curious  gift  that  is  yours  may  save  a  poor  devil's 


reason." 


Always  superior,  she  did  not  deny  the  gift  nor  did 
she  belittle  it.  She  put  it  properly  before  me. 

"One  may  psychometrise  an  object,  not  an  illusion." 
"Forgive  me,  this  was  nothing  of  the  kind." 
"A  lady  capable  of  a  triple  metamorphosis  while 
descending  a  flight  of  steps  may  not  be  a  ghost,  but 
certainly  she  is  a  moving  picture  and  would  you  not 
call  that  an  illusion?" 

"I  will  call  it  whatever  you  like.  But  I  do  not  believe 
she  spoke  to  Bradish.  I  believe  that  what  he*  said 
she  said  was  an  auditory  hallucination.  Now,  ignorant 
brute  that  I  am,  I  do  not  know  whether  I  have  an  open 
mind  or  not.  But  I  can  admit  that  if  he  had  an  audi 
tory  hallucination,  I  may  have  had  an  ocular  one. 
That  lady  may  be  a  figment  of  my  own  imagination. 
She  certainly  is  as  far  as  you  are  concerned.  Yet, 
assuming  that  Bradish  heard  nothing  and  that  I  saw 
less,  our  testimony  coincides  in  one  particular.  The 
vision  appeared  to  us  both.  There  is  no  illusion  about 
that." 

Her  head  drawn  back,  she  was  gazing  upward,  not 
at  the  ceiling,  but  through  it  and  beyond.  At  what? 
I  cannot  say.  At  other  stars  perhaps,  at  skies  more 


132  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

deeply  blue,  at  lands  that  would  be  divine  were  it  not 
for  man. 

A  picture  returned  and  I  displayed  it. 

"  'I  saw  the  sphinx  in  flight.  He  galloped  like  a 
jackal!'" 

Leisurely  she  redescended  to  earth  and  to  me. 

"You  have  a  solution?" 

"No,  but  I  had  an  impact.  It  directed  me  to  the 
Park.  Yesterday  I  saw  you  there.  Then  I  knew  why 
I  was  sent.  I  was  sent  to  meet  you,  for  you  alone  can 
help  us." 

"Tell  me  how." 

"I  will  tell  you  more.  Bradish  believes  that  the 
vision  has  misinterpreted  an  entirely  innocent  act  of  his. 
That  is  impossible.  Death  took  her  too  suddenly.  It  is 
true  she  might  have  acquired  an  erroneous  account  of 
it  where  she  is  and  that,  I  think,  is  his  idea.  Yet  how 
could  she?  One  does  not  gossip  in  the  astral.  At 
least  it  is  not  supposable.  But  he  won't  look  at  it  in 
that  way.  In  the  sheer  luxury  of  his  grief  he  wants 
to  get  at  her." 

"Orpheus  and  Eurydice!" 

"A  modern  version.  Orpheus,  whose  lyre  charmed 
all  nature,  all  hell  as  well,  tried  with  it  to  recover 
his  dear  departed.  Bradish  thinks  a  cheque  book 
equally  coercive.  I  was  idiot  enough  to  tell  him  of 
a  Thibetan  lama  who  had  evoked  a  dead  emperor. 
Yesterday  he  spoke  of  importing  one  quite  as  though 
he  had  only  to  cable  and  hang  the  expense." 

"Your  poor  Mr.  Bradish  might  know  that  every 
lama  is  not  a  magician  and  also  that  magic  is  not 
confined  to  Thibet." 

I   took   another   cigarette.      "There   are   satanists 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  133 

everywhere.      I    dare    say    there    are    a    few    here." 

She  moved  a  matchbox  to  me.  "I  know  of  one  by 
repute.  Probably  there  are  others.  The  atmosphere 
of  New  York,  charged  as  it  is  with  grossness,  is  highly 
favourable  for  them.  Yet  I  doubt  that  any  or  all  of 
them  could  help  your  friend  in  the  least.  I  doubt  that 
a  congress  of  black  magicians  could  summon  Nelly 
Chilton." 

"She  is  too  white,  you  mean?" 

"That  would  have  its  effect.  But  there  is  another 
reason,  one  of  a  different  order.  I " 

She  hesitated,  paused,  broke  it  off. 

I  picked  it  up.     "Well?" 

She  pushed  it  away.  "It  is  all  so  out  of  the  common 
that  sooner  or  later  I  shall  be  reading  it,  with  your 
name  on  the  cover.  You  have  been  living  it,  as  you 
said.  You  know  all  the  characters,  all  the  facts." 

"Not  all  the  facts,  there's  the  rub.  Even  otherwise, 
it  entirely  exceeds  my  absence  of  talent.  For  that  mat 
ter  I  can  think  of  but  one  writer  who  could  do  it 
justice  and  that  is  Bil  Sayers.  Have  you  read  The 
Dawn?" 

"Yes.    Do  you  like  it?" 

"Enormously.  The  book  is  very  able.  So  is  he. 
He  keeps  his  name  out  of  the  papers  and  nowadays  it 
takes  genius  to  do  that." 

For  a  moment  she  appeared  to  turn  it  over.  Then 
she  said:  "It  may  be  he  feels  that  a  writer  should  so 
arrange  his  life  that  posterity  can  find  no  evidence  of 
his  having  lived  at  all." 

I  laughed.  "There  are  writers  that  survive  only 
because  death  has  ignored  them.  But  all  this  is  shop- 
talk.  What  did  Canada  say?" 


i34  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Where  I  was  it  did  not  talk,  it  whispered.  I 
went  for  that  whisper.  At  times,  New  York  deafens 
me,  then  it  suffocates  and  I  have  to  get  away." 

"While  you  were  away,  I  took  the  liberty  of  enquir 
ing  for  you  at  Delatour's.  At  the  time  I  did  not  know 
but  that  you  might  be  the  lady  of  the  steps." 

"They  undeceived  you,  I  hope." 

"A  shiny  young  man  was  reasonably  vague.  I  left 
with  the  impression  that  somewhere  in  Canada  there 
was  a  young  gentlewoman  with  two  names  and  no 
address." 

"The  shiny  young  man  knew  me  only  as  an  expert. 
My  individuality  and  my  own  name  I  keep  for  my 
friends." 

"And  among  your  friends  is  a  sorcerer.  Would  you 
care  to  visit  his  cavern  tonight?" 

"Dear  Mr.  Delmonico?     I  should  love  to." 

I  stood  up.  "You're  a  brick.  I  will  stop  by  for  you 
then  at,  say " 

She  helped  me.     "At  seven-thirty." 

Presently  the  lift  was  redescending  me  to  earth. 

XVIII 

THAT  night,  when  the  philters  had  been  removed, 
the  den  of  the  necromancer  was  void  of  the  bewitched. 
The  disenthralled  were  afar,  at  the  sea,  in  the  moun 
tains.  Those  still  under  the  spell  had  gone  to  roof- 
gardens,  or  else  to  joys  less  severe.  In  a  corner  two 
phantoms  were  tenderly  telling  how  they  hated  each 
other.  Occasionally  a  goblin  moved  as  moves  a  form 
in  a  dream.  At  the  entrance  occasionally  a  face 
appeared  and  vanished.  Otherwise  we  were  alone. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  135 

Among  the  elixirs  had  been  a  flagon  of  Nuits. 
There  is  nothing  so  agreeably  demoralising.  A  faint 
reflection  of  its  scarlet  midnight  had  passed  into  her 
face.  On  the  table  her  right  hand  lay.  In  her  left 
hand  was  a  cigarette.  Though  years  have  gone  since 
then,  I  can  see  her  still,  see  the  smoke  as  she  blew  it 
through  her  teeth,  see  the  dawn  with  which  the  Nuits 
had  tinted  her  face.  From  the  back  of  her  chair 
her  wrap  trailed.  The  colour,  pale  amber,  rhymed 
with  her  dress  which  was  mauve  and  which  left  her 
slimly  and  decently  naked,  not  severely  nude  as  one 
of  the  post-bellum  frocks  that  began  too  late  and  ended 
too  soon  would  have  done,  but  after  the  engaging  man 
ner  of  what  was  fashion  then,  just  calmly  and  properly 
bare.  In  that  dress  she  looked  like  a  song  from  Shelley 
translated  by  Baudelaire.  The  aerial  effect  was  there; 
there  too  was  the  odour  of  exotics  and  these  influences 
were  more  subtly  incandescent  than  the  headiness  which 
Nelly  Chilton  in  her  more  definite  beauty  had  exhaled. 
Of  that  beauty  one  had  been  at  once  aware.  It  was 
flagrant.  The  beauty  of  this  girl  disclosed  itself  slowly 
as  perfection  ever  does.  It  needed  custom  and  a  certain 
degree  of  intimacy  before  the  full  loveliness  appeared. 
An  acquired  taste  perhaps,  yet  a  taste  which  once 
acquired  none  other  can  replace. 

Ouvrons  nos  coeurs  aux  ivresses  nouvelles. 

In  that  line  of  Leconte  de  Lisle  there  is  an  invitation 
and  a  wisdom  which  most  of  us  miss.  Lifting  the 
thimble  of  another  elixir  I  was  about  to  repeat  it  to 
her  when  she  took  it  from  me.  With  that  curious 
divinatory  gift  which  she  possessed  she  may  have  seen 


136  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

it  coming  and,  conscious  that  it  awoke  no  echo,  she 
waved  it  away.  The  heights  are  not  for  every  mortal. 
They  were  not  to  be  mine  that  night. 

uWe  are  here  on  business,"  she  was  saying  and  look 
ing  as  she  said  it  as  unbusinesslike  as  you  please.  "If 
I  am  to  help,  there  are  one  or  two  things  I  should 
know.  Whom  had  she  that  was  near  to  her?" 

"Well,"  I  said,  "she  had  at  least  one  distant  rela 
tive.  That  was  her  mother.  Mrs.  Chilton  had  a  Dar 
ling  for  her  always.  I  think  though  it  came  from  the 
lips.  At  heart  I  think  she  looked  on  the  girl  as  a 
golden  egg,  or  do  I  mean  the  hen  that  lays  it?" 

"And  her  father,  was  he  a  distant  relative  also?" 

"A  foreign  one  I  should  say.  At  some  time  or  other 
he  folded  his  tent.  He  may  be  now  in  Paris  or  he  may 
be  in  San  Francisco.  When  a  New  Yorker  concludes 
to  disappear  he  makes  for  the  coast,  or  else  for  the 
Seine.  What  determines  the  choice  must  depend  on 
memory,  or  such  information  as  a  club  window  sup 
plies." 

"A  man  of  position  was  he?" 

"I  do  not  know.  I  do  not  know  what  a  man  of 
position  is.  But  I  fancy  he  was  reasonably  aware  that 
he  came  of  good  stock.  If  he  had  come  of  better  stock 
he  might  have  omitted  to  be  aware  of  it  at  all." 

She  raised  a  slender  finger.  "If  I  am  to  help  you 
to  help  Mr.  Bradish,  please  do  not  talk  like  a  society 
play." 

I  raised  my  hand  in  salute. 

The  slender  finger  sank. 

"The  golden  egg  you  mention  spells  Mr.  Bradish, 
I  suppose.  From  the  spelling  am  I  to  infer  the  wolf?" 

"The    whole    pack.      They    chased    Mrs.    Chilton 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  137 

through  the  doors  of  Bradish's  bank  where  she  dodged 
in  and  out  and  ran  into  a  fine  fellow  who  promised  her 
the  penitentiary  unless  she  permitted  him  to  make  up 
to  her  daughter.  Or  so  at  least  she  confided  to 
Bradish." 

"You  mean  she  invented  it?" 

"At  any  rate,  Bradish  swallowed  it.  And  here  the 
plot  thickens.  Previously  and,  I  fancy,  by  prearrange- 
ment,  the  fine  fellow  had  shown  Bradish  a  forged 
cheque  which  naturally  he  disowned  and,  as  it  hap 
pened,  in  the  presence  of  witnesses.  At  the  moment, 
the  poor  chap  never  for  an  instant  imagined  that  Jim 
the  Penman  was  Mrs.  Chilton.  An  hour  later  she 
swam  in,  owned  up  and,  the  next  day,  with*  an  imagi 
nary  penitentiary  staring  her  in  the  face,  frightened 
her  daughter  into  taking  him.  For  a  moment  only. 
Since  then  Bradish  has  learned  the  truth.  He  thinks 
she  has  also  and  thinks  she  believes  he  knew  of  it  at 
the  time  and  got  her  under  false  pretences." 

Aly  Bolton,  dropping  her  cigarette  in  a  fingerbowl, 
watched  it  drown  and  looked  up  at  me. 

"There  was  a  nearer  one  yet?" 

"Much  nearer.  A  chap  named  Austen.  She  was 
dead  in  love  with  him  and  is  still  for  that  matter. 
Dead  in  love  is  a  ridiculous  expression  when  applied 
to  the  living,  but  it  fits  a  ghost." 

Up  again  went  that  slender  finger.  "I  asked  you 
not  to  talk  like  a  society  play  and  now  you  are  trying 
to  talk  like  a  low  comedian." 

"I  wish  I  might  so  talk  that " 

She  had  taken  her  gloves.  She  was  reaching  back 
for  the  wrap.  I  saw  that  the  nature  of  my  conversa 
tional  ambitions  she  divined  and  dismissed. 


138  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Summoning  a  goblin,  I  paid  and  off  we  went  and 
into  a  cab  where  I  did  not  attempt  to  take  her  hand. 
I  knew  it  would  be  withdrawn.  I  knew  she  was  not 
the  girl  to  give  a  man  the  lesser  mystery  of  a  hand 
to  hold  unless  the  greater  mysteries  were  to  follow. 

I  knew  she  would  never  graduate  the  degrees  to  the 
the  temple.  I  knew  she  might  never  give  anything,  but 
I  knew  also  that  if  she  ever  did,  the  gift,  however 
slight,  would  be  the  token  of  everything  else.  I  not 
only  knew  that,  I  knew  that  she  knew  exactly  what  I 
was  thinking. 

The  experience  of  making  up  to  her  without  the 
necessity  of  saying  a  word,  delighted  me.  It  supplied  all 
the  enticements  of  love  without  any  of  its  disillusions. 

But  at  once  I  was  conscious  that  even  the  immaterial 
was  denied  me.  We  were  seated  together,  a  fold  of 
her  wrap  just  touching  me,  and  it  was  through  the  fold 
that  she  may  have  got  the  current  of  my  thoughts  that 
were  perfumed  with  her  imagined  kisses.  In  any  event, 
without  moving  an  inch,  she  drew  the  fold  from  me. 
The  motion  she  made  was  so  slight  that  had  I  been 
less  conscious  of  her  I  would  not  have  noticed  it.  But 
I  did  notice  it.  I  knew  it  was  a  rebuke,  one  as  unspoken 
as  everything  else  had  been,  and  turning  to  her  I 
raised  my  hat. 

"Forgive  me." 

Readily  she  might  have  asked  for  what?  Readily 
she  might  have  pretended  ignorance.  There  was  no 
pretence  about  Aly  Bolton. 

"Yes,"  she  said.    "I  will."    She  paused  and  added: 

"We  have  to  see  Mr.  Bradish  through  and  for  that 
we  must  be  friends." 

Friends  1    Dear  me,  how  long  ago  that  is ! 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  139 

XIX 

THE  next  day  it  rained  ravishingly,  a  rich  downpour 
that  ordinarily  would  have  been  to  me  life's  full  de 
light.  A  nice  long  rainy  day,  what  more  can  the  heart 
desire?  It  keeps  you  in  and  keeps  others  out.  But 
my  table  was  bare.  Bare  was  the  cupboard  of  my 
mind.  I  had  squandered  my  substance  on  ghosts  and 
girls.  In  revenge,  that  drab  of  a  muse  had  fled.  She 
had  deserted  my  bed  and  board.  Mentally,  that  day, 
I  was  dished. 

To  the  ripple  of  the  rain  I  beat  a  tattoo  on  the  win 
dow.  Hollow  device.  Wearying  of  it  and  conscious 
of  being  in  low  spirits,  the  genial  idea  occurred  to  me 
of  cheering  Bradish  up. 

The  fates  had  ordered  otherwise.  When  drippingly 
I  got  to  his  house,  Mr.  Bradish  was  not  at  home,  sir. 
Would  I  wait?  No,  I  would  not,  and  I  descended  on 
the  Buck  Club  where  that  gay  ass  Brevoort  supplied  me 
with  arid  jests  and  offers  of  liquid  refreshment. 

"See  here,"  in  my  misery  I  said  to  him.  "What's 
up?" 

"Not  stocks.  They  have  been  up.  Now  they  are 
down.  Thank  the  Lord  they  can't  go  sideways.  An 
other  Martini?" 

The  day,  though  dark,  was  young.  There  were  but 
two  other  members  in  the  room  and  they  were  at  the 
farther  window.  I  knew  that  intentionally  they  would 
not  listen  and  that  even  otherwise  they  were  too  re 
moved  to  overhear.  Mentally  I  weighed  it.  Should  I 
tell  him?  Weighing  it  still,  I  beat  about  the  bush. 

"The  last  time  I  saw  you,  a  very  affable  person  con- 


1 40  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

verted  your  handkerchief  into  a  conservatory.  Re 
member  it?" 

"Shook  it  out,  the  beggar  did,  over  Miss  Chilton. 
Should  say  I  do  remember." 

At  his  empty  glass  he  nodded.  "Tell  you  what. 
When  I  read  about  her,  it  knocked  me  silly." 

Cautiously  he  looked  at  the  other  window.  "I  say  I 
You  don't  believe  in  ghosts,  do  you?" 

"No,  I  don't,"  I  told  him.  "But  I  am  dreadfully 
afraid  of  them." 

Yet  as  I  uttered  that  antique  stupidity,  I  gasped. 

The  gay  ass  now  was  solemn.  "Six  days  ago,  no, 
hold  on,  five,  it  was  on  the  eighteenth,  I  know  because 
I  had  an  appointment  with  my  dentist.  I  was  on  my 
way  to  him  when  I  ran  smack  into  her.  You  don't 
believe  me,  of  course  not.  Would  not  believe  my  own 
mother  if  she  told  me.  Couldn't  believe  it  myself. 
Yet  there  was  Nelly  Chilton  and  I  off  with  my  hat. 
Never  noticed  me.  Passed  straight  on.  I  tell  you 
a  feather  would  have  done  for  me.  What  bucked  me, 
the  Lord  only  knows,  but  I  doubled  and  followed  her. 
Followed  her  straight  into  a  shop  and  found  it  was 
she  and  yet  that  it  wasn't." 

I  snarled  at  him.     "What  do  you  mean?" 

"Search  me.  Looked  exactly  like  herself  and  yet 
she  didn't." 

I  snarled  again.  "That  second  Martini  that  you 
haven't  had,  has  not  gone  to  your  head,  has  it?" 

"I  don't  wonder  you  ask.  But  I  tell  you  there  was 
something  damn  queer  about  it." 

"You  know  she  is  dead,  don't  you?" 

"Of  course  I  know  it.  If  the  notice  in  the  paper 
had  not  said,  'Funeral  private/  I'd  have  gone.  Sent 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  141 

flowers  though.     Knew  her  when  she  was  knee-high. " 

He  touched  a  bell  and  ordered.     "Two  Martinis." 

I  rounded  on  him.    "In  the  shop,  how  did  she  look?" 

"Ghastly." 

"Shop  lighted?" 

"They  all  are." 

"Calcium?" 

"Don't  remember.    Why?" 

"That  might  account  for  it.    Besides " 

"Besides  what?" 

"If  you  knew  her  since  she  was  a  child,  you  must 
have  known  her  people.  Had  she  any  cousins?" 

"Her  father  is  the  last  of  the  Chiltons." 

"Is  her  mother  equally  unique?" 

"Her  mother  was  a  Fellowes  and,  by  George  I  now 
I  come  to  think  of  it " 

"Well,  what?" 

"She  had  a  brother,  Cranston  Fellowes.  He's  dead. 
Got  drunk  on  a  yacht  and  fell  overboard.  They  fished 
him  out.  Too  much  for  him  though.  Pneumonia 
probably.  That  was  before  my  time.  Heard  of  it 
often  though.  My  governor  knew  him.  Said  he  and 
Mrs.  Chilton  were  the  living  image  of  each  other.  Now 
he  had  a  daughter.  Never  saw  her.  Don't  know  any 
body  that  ever  did.  When  she  was  fourteen  she  bolted 
with  a  chauffeur." 

"A  chauffeur!"  I  exclaimed. 

Gaily  the  gay  ass  laughed:  "Hey,  why  not?  Every 
body  can't  be  a  best-seller." 

The  cocktails  had  come.  While  he  was  drinking 
his,  it  naturally  occurred  to  me  that  the  lady  of  the 
steps  and  the  lady  in  the  shop  must  be  the  same  and, 
conceivably,  the  chauffeur's  inamorata. 


i42  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

I  raised  my  glass.     uWhat  did  she  do  in  the  shop?" 

"That's  it!  A  floorwalker  asked  what  I  wanted.  I 
looked  at  him  as  much  as  to  say,  'speak  when  you're 
spoken  to,'  just  looked  from  her  at  him  and  back  again 
and,  begad,  she'd  gone!" 

The  coincidence  was  so  striking  that  untasted  I  put 
the  cocktail  down  and  tentatively  played  out  a  rope. 

"The  usual  sea  of  millinery  had  engulfed  her." 

"Devilish  high  the  sea  must  have  been  to  carry  her 
off  like  that." 

Still  playing  out  the  rope,  I  laughed.  "Not  a  bit  of 
it.  The  trouble  with  you  is  you  are  too  fascinating. 
A  woman  has  eyes  in  the  back  of  her  head.  This 
woman  knew  you  were  following  her.  She  feared  for 
herself  and  entered  a  shop  to  lose  you." 

If  you  can  chuckle  gravely,  the  gay  ass  did.  Yet 
at  once,  assuming  a  false  modesty,  he  waved  the  pic 
ture  away. 

"Oh,  for  all  of  me " 

Again  I  rounded  on  him.  "Look  here!  You  go 
about  telling  other  people  what  you  have  told  me  and 
before  you  can  say  Jack  Robinson  they'll  clap  you  in 
Bloomingdale.  Isn't  it  obvious  that  the  lady  in  the 
shop  is  your  chauffeur's  girl?" 

"He  isn't  my  chauffeur.  What's  more,  I  fancy  she 
is  no  longer  his.  But  perhaps  you  are  right.  It  may 
have  been  she.  I  didn't  think  of  it  before." 

"Think  of  it  now  then." 

We  were  seated  as,  in  a  club,  men  often  are,  at  a 
window.  Through  it,  for  a  little  since,  I  had  been 
aware  of  an  encroaching  blue.  The  ravishing  rain  had 
ceased.  Westward  the  sky  had  cleared.  At  the  houses 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  143 

opposite,  the  sun,  from  its  magic  treasury,  was  tossing 
aigrettes  of  gold. 

But  now  a  youth  in  a  slashed  waistcoat  was  bearing 
down  on  us. 

"Beg  pardon,  Mr.  Brevoort.    A  telephone  call,  sir." 

With  a  gesture  of  excuse,  he  left  me.  I  was  glad 
of  it.  The  advice  I  had  volunteered  applied  to  us  both. 
I  too  needed  to  think  of  it  and  while  he  was  shut  in  a 
cupboard,  I  ferreted  about,  found  my  umbrella  and 
went  out. 

To  go  out  when  you  have  nowhere  to  go  affords  a 
spaciousness  of  freedom  that  is  eminently  relaxing.  I 
had  no  wish  to  curtail  it.  After  the  stuffiness  of  that 
window,  the  puddles  and  gasolined  air  exhilarated  and 
though  it  would  be  an  excess  of  metaphor  to  say  that 
they  enlightened,  none  the  less  at  the  next  corner  I 
threw  the  chauffeur's  girl  into  the  middle  of  the  street. 
Good  enough  for  that  gay  ass  if  he  wanted  her,  she 
was  too  fanciful  for  me.  For  a  moment  I  had  been 
inclined  to  swallow  her,  but  on  that  corner  I  threw 
her  up.  The  facial  resemblance  of  cousins  is  rarely 
vivid  and  I  abandoned  the  young  woman  with  a  shrug. 

I  was  yet  to  learn  that  one  does  not  get  rid  of  a 
girl  like  that.  It  was  some  time  before  she  caught  up 
with  me  again  but  when  I  next  saw  her,  then,  in  return 
for  my  shrug,  she  gave  me  a  start. 

It  was  near  the  Cathedral  that  I  said  goodbye  to 
the  misconducted  daughter  of  Cranston  Fellowes  who, 
in  addition  to  outraging  the  proprieties  with  a  chauf 
feur,  had  managed  to  become  mistaken  for  a  ghost,  and 
although  I  dropped  her  there,  originally,  in  the  club 
window  where  I  first  saw  her,  I  had  thought  of  taking 


144  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

her  along  and  making  her  go  through  her  tricks  for 
the  benefit  of  Bradish  and  his  peace  of  mind. 

Yet,  as  I  afterward  realised,  nothing  earthly  could 
have  benefited  him.  Back  of  the  doors  that  close  be 
hind  our  birth  it  must  have  been  all  prearranged. 
Long  ago,  on  inaccessible  spheres,  for  some  sin  anterior 
and  forgotten,  all  that  had  happened  to  him  and  all 
that  was  yet  to  happen,  must  have  been  written  in  his 
progression.  Men  who  denounce  the  injustice  of  fate 
do  not  realise  that  their  destiny  is  self-made,  that  as 
they  sow  they  reap,  though  the  reaping  be  postponed 
until  their  nominal  death  has  intervened  and  they  re 
turn  here  for  the  harvest. 

These  esotericisms  did  not  occur  to  me  when  I  was 
throwing  the  chauffeur's  girl  in  the  street.  They  came, 
with  other  things  in  their  train,  years  later.  At  the 
time,  innocently,  in  my  ignorance,  I  thought  that  one 
may  outwit  fate.  Innocently  and  ignorantly  I  thought 
I  might  help  Bradish.  I  know  I  tried  and,  in  his  hor 
rible  journey  to  nowhere  and  back,  it  is  possible  that 
my  efforts  were  of  aid.  But  the  journey  itself,  the 
long  road  hedged  with  hazards,  no  one  but  he  could 
take,  no  one  could  save  him  from  it.  In  the  secret 
chambers  of  his  soul  he  followed  it.  He  had  to  follow 
it.  Ineluctable  as  such  journeys  ever  are,  that  journey 
was  his  destiny  self-made.  But  I  can  say  for  him, 
that  though  he  fell,  as  again  and  again  he  did  fall, 
he  saw  it  through  and,  not  at  the  end,  there  was  no  end, 
there  never  is  an  end,  but  somewhere,  midway  between 
nothing  and  nowhere  on  that  hazard-strewn  road,  he 
found  peace.  How  he  found  it,  and  where  he  found 
it,  will  be  related  later  on.  Yet,  now  that  I  think  of 
it,  Swinburne  told  it  better  than  I  can,  better  than 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  145 

anyone  could.     "Even  the  weariest  river  winds  some 
where  safe  to  sea." 


XX 

"I  DON'T  like  it,  sir,"  Peters  was  telling  me. 

It  was  in  my  workshop.  I  am  not  the  Pope  and  I 
had  asked  him  to  sit  down.  I  do  not  think  he  liked 
that  either.  In  any  event,  an  expert  in  his  vocation,  he 
knew  the  niceties  of  its  etiquette  too  well  to  accept. 
Civilly,  but  firmly,  he  had  refused. 

"Well,  Peters,"  I  told  him,  "you  know  I  cannot 
listen  to  you.  What  Mr.  Bradish  does  is  his  own  affair. 
If  he  cares  to  tell  me  that  is  another  kettle  of  fish, 
but  you  ought  not  to." 

"Then  who  can  I  tell,  sir?" 

That  was  it.  Bradish  had  relatives  whom  he  studi 
ously  avoided.  There  was  no  one  to  stand  in  loco 
parentis.  To  produce  another  legal  phrase,  I  was  his 
nearest  friend. 

For  a  moment  I  turned  it  over.  An  idea  crossed  it 
and  I  said : 

"Anyway,  say  nothing  to  Dr.  Cally." 

"No,  sir,  I  certainly  will  not,  sir.  But  that  now 
is  another  thing  that  has  made  me  hanxious.  I  asked 
Mr.  Bradish  if  he  would  wish  me  to  have  Dr.  Cally 
in.  Mr.  Bradish  has  always  been  most  the  gentleman 
to  us  servants.  But  he  cursed  me  something  dreadful. 
He  looked  frightful,  sir.  I  was  afraid  he'd  have  a  fit. 
But  if  I  may  take  the  liberty  of  saying  it,  the  people 
that  come  there — "  and  Peters  raised  a  hand  in  mor 
tification — "they " 

I  interrupted  him.     "I  can't  listen  to  that.     I  will 


146  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

stop  by  and  if  Mr.  Bradish  cares  to  tell  me  anything  I 
may  know  what  to  say.  In  that  box  over  there  you  will 
find  some  cigars.  Help  yourself." 

A  week  had  gone  since  I  threw  the  chauffeur's  girl 
overboard.  In  the  interim,  my  old  drab  of  a  muse 
had  returned  more  in  love  with  me  than  before.  Poor 
taste  on  her  part,  but  there  she  was  and  I  had  been 
wringing  from  her  a  tale  of  the  west.  As,  at  the 
time,  I  had  not  been  farther  west  than  Hoboken,  local 
colour  stood  about  in  jars.  I  had  only  to  help  myself. 
Within  range  of  my  gun — which  I  could  pull  by  a  slight 
of  wrist  too  quick  for  the  eye  to  detect — were  prairies, 
cattle,  saloons,  faro-banks,  cowboys,  bad  men,  bad 
lands  and  The  Girl,  a  flower,  fleet  as  a  mustang  and 
pure  as  prayer. 

I  had  gone  at  the  accursed  thing  because  I  could  not 
go  at  the  ghost  story  and  I  could  not  go  at  that  because 
I  was  living  it.  You  never  can  properly  begin  a  novel 
until  it  is  finished. 

All  that  by  the  way.  I  enter  it  in  these  papers  only 
that  I  may  make  it  clear,  how  it  was  that  since  the 
ravishing  day  when  I  pitched  Miss  Fellowes  in  the 
mud,  I  had  not  seen  Bradish,  or  Aly  Bolton  either. 
For  that  matter,  I  had  not  even  revisited  the  Park. 
But,  at  the  time,  I  felt  that  the  lady  of  the  steps  would 
descend  them  no  more.  It  seemed  to  me  that  when 
Bradish  first  saw  her  there,  she  had  not  seen  him.  It 
seemed  to  me  also  that  when  she  did  see  him,  she  may 
have  feared  that  if  she  went  there  again,  some  effort 
might  be  made  to  detain  her.  I  have,  it  is  true,  no 
facts  to  support  my  opinion,  but  I  believe  that  the 
second  time  she  was  seen  on  those  steps  was  the  last 
time  she  returned  there.  In  any  event,  neither  Brad- 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  147 

ish  nor  I  saw  her  there  again,  nor  have  I  heard  of 
anyone  more  fortunate. 

But  to  go  back  a  bit.  I  was  in  the  workshop  wring 
ing  a  farrage  of  rot  from  that  drab,  taking  down  her 
gurgles,  when  I  heard  someone  without.  There  was 
no  pounding;  just  a  tap,  just  a  voice. 

"Please,  sir.     It's  Peters." 

It  was  an  awkward  and  perilous  moment.  But  some 
thing  might  be  wrong  with  Bradish.  Consequently  I 
had  no  recourse  but  to  go  forward  with  a  backward 
eye  and,  while  clutching  the  story  with  one  hand,  open 
the  door  with  the  other. 

Four  minutes  later,  Peters  had  gone.  With  him  that 
fly-by-night  had  flown.  Try  as  I  might,  it  was  idle, 
not  a  line  would  come.  The  only  thing  that  prevented 
me  from  throwing  my  inkstand  out  of  the  window  was 
the  subliminal  consciousness  that  I  would  have  to  buy 
another. 

In  the  circumstances,  what  I  did  do  was  perhaps  ex 
cessive.  Resigning  myself  to  the  will  of  the  gods,  I 
went  to  sleep. 

I  awoke  with  a  jump.  Either  the  house  had  blown 
up  or  else  the  roof  had  fallen  in.  But  no,  it  was  merely 
Bradish  at  the  door. 

Without  any  of  the  amenities  of  life,  he  issued  his 
edict.  I  was  to  come  to  his  house  at  once.  The  pro- 
nunciamento  pronounced,  he  deigned  to  be  scurrilous. 

"What  on  earth  have  you  been  doing?" 

"Writing  a  book." 

"Why  haven't  you  looked  in  on  me?" 

"Writing  a  book  is  like  having  a  baby.  Any  inter 
ruption  is  at  the  expense  of  the  child." 

"You  talk  like  a  wetnurse  and  act  like  a  thug.     I 


i48  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

would  have  telephoned,  wired  or  sent,  but  no  one  can 
get  at  you.  Here  I  am,  on  the  edge  of  it,  and  I  have 
had  to  come  myself.  What  is  more,  a  blear-eyed 
scoundrel  below  told  me  you  had  married  and  moved 
to  Brooklyn.  What  a  devil  of  a  way  to  live !" 

We  were  on  the  stair  while  he  was  singing  that  song 
and  presently  we  were  in  his  car. 

There  he  improvised  another.  "That  door  is  not 
as  tight  as  you  think.  I  have  got  the  locksmith." 

As  he  said  that,  I  could  see  Peters,  his  hand  lifted 
in  mortification  at  the  people  Bradish  received. 

"Where  did  you  find  him?"  I  asked.  "In  the  gut 
ter?" 

"It  was  a  bookshop." 

"A  bookshop !"  I  amazedly  repeated. 

"A  cellar.  Run  by  a  lousy  old  party  who  sells  queer 
trash.  Sells  it,  no,  has  it  on  tap  and  sits  there  looking 
at  it,  twirling  his  thumbs,  waiting  for  customers  that 
never  come.  He  had  the  effrontery  to  tell  me  he  was 
busy,  yes  and  fearless." 

"How  did  you " 

"How  did  I  find  him?  Through  another  bookseller. 
When  I  got  in  the  cellar  I  asked  for  occult  literature 
and  an  instructor.  It  was  then  he  told  me  he  was 
busy.  I  paid  him  for  his  time,  promised  him  more 
money  and  gave  him  my  address.  He  has  been  send 
ing  instructors  ever  since.  Of  the  lot,  I  selected  one. 
He  is  the  locksmith.  He  says  he  can  make  the  door 
open  of  itself.  If  he  does,  I  believe  I  shall  die  of 
joy  after  having  nearly  died  of  grief." 

We  were  flying  through  the  Park.  I  was  looking  at 
the  stars,  at  the  myriad  worlds,  and  a  very  convincing 
spectacle  they  are  when  you  have  erroneous  ideas  of 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  149 

your  own  importance.  In  the  light  of  suns  that  reach 
us  aeons  after  the  suns  themselves  have  ceased  to  be, 
it  occurred  to  me  that  Bradish  had  an  idea,  perhaps 
exaggerated,  of  the  importance  of  mundane  joys  and 
sorrows.  What  he  had  said  about  the  door  opening 
of  itself  seemed  to  me  equally  exaggerated.  I  do  not 
believe  in  miracles,  although  in  view  of  my  literary 
crimes  it  must  have  required  a  procession  of  them  to 
keep  me  out  of  Sing  Sing. 

The  flight  of  the  car  diminished  into  a  soapy  slide. 
We  were  at  the  house  where,  as  usual,  Peters  was  in 
the  hall.  His  face,  as  wooden  as  ever,  was  an  expres 
sionless  mask  from  which  his  eyes  looked  at  me.  There 
was  no  recognition  in  them,  but  there  was,  I  thought, 
anxiety. 

Bradish,  meanwhile,  had  said  a  word  to  him. 

"When  the  magus  comes  we  will  be  in  the  library." 

The  magus!  I  chewed  the  title.  The  taste  was 
rotten. 

But  in  the  library  where  already  Gedney  had  pre 
ceded  us,  there  were,  in  addition  to  authors  less  inter 
esting,  a  set  of  the  works  of  the  monks  of  Chartreuse, 
operas  from  Cognac,  and  a  sonata,  pale  yellow,  that 
had  been  composed  in  Rotterdam. 

Bradish  began  reading  one  of  them  and,  I  thought, 
very  fluently. 

Patting  his  mouth  with  his  handkerchief,  he  sat  down 
at  the  table  where  already  I  had  seated  myself  and  to 
which  he  drew  another  chair. 

"For  the  magus,"  he  told  me. 

I  smiled.     "Have  you  found  him  expensive?" 

"Well,"  he  replied,  drinking  quite  as  fluently  again, 
"no."  He  waved  the  glass,  indicating  the  room,  the 


150  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

spaciousness  of  the  great,  white,  staring  house.  uln 
view  of  this,  I  suppose  he  put  prices  up  a  peg  or  two. 
But  that  is  neither  here  nor  there.  At  any  figure  the 
key  will  be  cheap.  By  the  way,  I  wish  you  would  ask 
for  a  look  at  it.  I  know  nothing  of  these  things  and 
you  do." 

I  sat  back.  "Good  heavens!  What  I  know  could 
find  a  playground  on  the  head  of  a  pin.  A  few  odds 
and  ends  I  may  have  picked  up,  but  that  is  all  that 
can  be  picked  up  by  anyone  not  an  initiate  and  the 
initiate  tell  nothing.  Or,  if  they  do,  they  are  killed." 

Bradish  put  down  the  glass.  "How  killed?  What 
do  you  mean?" 

"In  France  a  man  named  Delormel,  who  was  an  ini 
tiate,  published  a  book — La  Periode  Solaire.  What 
was  in  it  I  do  not  know,  but  I  do  know  that  in  twenty- 
four  hours  not  one  single  copy  of  that  book  was  any 
where  obtainable  and  Delormel  was  dead." 

"The  magus!" 

It  was  Gedney  announcing  the  locksmith  who,  at 
the  entrance,  folded  his  arms  and  bowed. 

Affectations  have  never  appealed  to  me  and  that 
affectation  of  orientalism  angered.  To  give  him  such 
credit  as  may  have  been  his  due,  he  saw  my  hostility 
at  once,  and  saw  it,  too,  though  my  expression  had  not 
altered. 

But  such  credit  as  may  have  been  his  due,  he  must 
have  been  unable  to  obtain  elsewhere.  Thin,  and  by 
comparison  with  Bradish  and  myself,  undersized,  he 
wore  a  long  frock  coat,  stained  and  shabby.  On  one 
hand  he  had  a  glove  from  which  a  finger  had  promi 
nently  gone.  He  had  a  high  frayed  collar,  a  dingy 
black  stock,  but  no  cuffs,  none  at  least  that  I  could 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  151 

see,  and  I  divined  the  complete  absence  of  linen.  The 
man  was  in  rags  and  he  held  himself  with  an  air  that 
Frederick  Le  Maftre  may  have  displayed,  when,  in 
Robert  Macaire,  he  appeared  princely  in  tatters. 

He  bowed  again,  moved  toward  us  and  sat  down. 
His  eyes  large,  black,  piercing,  commanding,  turned 
from  Bradish  to  me.  His  hair,  yellowish  white,  the 
colour  of  old  straw,  was  abundant  and  through  it  he 
ran  that  fingerless  glove.  His  features,  plainly  Semitic, 
were  otherwise  regular  and  his  skin,  pale  saffron,  was 
blotched.  He  might  have  been  forty.  He  may  have 
been  a  hundred. 

As  silent  he  sat,  turning  his  eyes  without  moving  his 
head,  I  thought  him  the  most  repellent  creature  I  had 
ever  beheld,  a  soul  unclean,  which  is  common  enough; 
but  a  soul  so  unclean  that  it  attracted  elementals  as 
filth  draws  flies.  Things  revolting,  unmaterialised  and 
therefore  invisible,  but  none  the  less  hideous,  might,  I 
thought,  be  crawling  all  over  him  and,  conceivably, 
might  crawl  from  him  to  me.  Mentally  I  crossed  my 
self.  Physically  I  edged  away. 

He  saw  that  as,  presumably,  he  saw  everything  and 
smiled.  But  what  a  smile !  A  smile  that  disclosed 
teeth  that  were  vulperine,  black  and  yellow,  pointed 
and  sharp,  the  fangs  of  a  human  hyena. 

Then  at  once,  but  slowly,  in  the  voice  of  a  ventrilo 
quist,  each  syllable  carefully  enunciated,  he  addressed 
me. 

"You  are  young,  therefore  ignorant  and  in  ignorance 
is  disdain.  You  are  contemptuous  and  unaware  that 
I  am  a  priest.  Magus  means  priest  and  the  knowledge 
you  lack  and  which  I  possess  is  the  sacred  wisdom  to 
which  Plato,  Plutarch  and  Virgil  bowed  and  which 


152  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

caused  three  of  its  hierophants  to  lay  symbolic  homages 
at  the  cradle  of  your  Lord.  That  wisdom,  the  Magh 
dim,  created  the  gigantic  civilisations  whose  ruins  still 
support  the  weight  of  sixty  cycles.  In  your  ignorance 
you  disdain  the  Maghdim  which,  in  your  mouth,  is 
magic  and  magic  a  conjurer's  device.  Sir,  magic  is 
will.  It  was  by  the  magic  of  his  own  will  that  Brahma 
created  whatever  is.  By  will  man  may  also  create, 
he  may  acquire  prerogatives  apparently  superhuman 
and,  if  he  be  an  adept,  even  as  I,  he  can  will  to  his 
will  all  the  forces  and  powers  of  nature." 

I  nodded  at  him.  "You  are  entirely  right.  I  am 
an  ignorant  brute.  Ignorant  and  cynical.  But  I  have 
heard  that  magic  is  of  two  classes,  the  white  and  the 
black;  that  the  one  works  through  pantacles  and  prayer, 
the  other  by  sacrilege  and  Satanism.  Yours,  I  assume 
is  the  latter.  Jim,  pass  the  bottle.  Give  the  magus 
a  drink." 

"I  do  not  consume  liquor,  sir,  and  if  I  may  further 
instruct  you,  Satan  is  the  name  that  the  perversely 
ignorant  give  to  Elim  Sabaot." 

"Who  is  that?"  Bradish  asked. 

"Elim  Sabaot  is  the  Being  whom  you  call  God." 

"Ah,  yes!"  I  exclaimed.  Illiterately  I  added: 
"Elim  Sabaot  is  the  incommunicable  name  of  which  the 
mention  was  forbidden  and  which  is  employed  now  only 
in  magical  mantras  by  vulgar  thaumaturges.  Do  you 
count  yourself  among  them,  Magus?" 

"Sir,  I  am  a  priest  of  the  Maghdim,  and  if  that  be 
vulgar  and  black,  then  black  and  vulgar  was  the  power 
with  which  Swedenborg  summoned  the  dead.  Black 
and  vulgar  also  was  the  power  which  Spiridon,  a  bishop 
whom  the  Church  made  a  saint,  evoked  the  spirit  of  his 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  153 

daughter.  Spiridon  and  Swedenborg  were  priests  of 
the  Maghdim,  even  as  I." 

"Good  Lord!"  I  disgustedly  exclaimed.  "If  it 
comes  to  that,  then  so  was  Cagliostro." 

"Permit  me  again  to  correct  you,  sir.  Cagliostro, 
though  he  summoned  the  dead  and  had  them  parade 
before  his  guests  at  supper,  possessed  but  an  imperfect 
knowledge  of  the  sacred  science  and  was  surrendered 
by  the  true  magi  to  the  Roman  Inquisition." 

Physically  the  creature  was  revolting.  Morally  he 
nauseated  me.  I  felt  I  could  stand  it  no  longer  and  I 
started  to  go,  but  beforehand  I  gave  him  one  more. 

"It  is  wonderful  to  meet  anyone  as  invariably  right 
as  you  are.  At  the  same  time,  the  honour  of  being 
addressed  by  Cagliostro's  superior  is  too  overwhelm 
ing.  Jim,  I'll  borrow  your  car  and  go  home." 

The  beast  had  risen.    He  turned  to  Bradish. 

"Since  your  friend  intends  to  counsel  you  against 
my  offices:  nay,  by  his  manner  has  so  counselled  you 
already,  it  is  for  me  to  go." 

He  backed  to  the  entrance.  There,  folding  his 
arms,  he  bowed  as  he  had  bowed  before. 

Bradish  followed  him  out.  For  a  moment  I  could 
hear  them  talking,  their  voices  diminishing  as  they 
went,  the  key  jingling  in  the  wake.  I  was  sorry  then 
I  had  not  asked  to  look  at  it  and  then  flung  it  in  the 
vermin's  face. 

For  assuming  the  key,  assuming  also  that  it  had  even 
a  minor  value,  it  would  have  opened  one  door  at  least, 
the  door  of  some  box  in  which  there  was  coin.  Yet, 
I  suddenly  had  to  ask  myself,  was  it  not  already  in  the 
lock  of  the  cheque-book  that  Bradish  signed?  The 


154  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

fact  that  Bradish  was  a  fool  and  this  creature  a  knave 
did  not  lessen  the  magic  of  that. 

But  there  was  another  angle,  far  more  important. 
Any  key  of  a  door  to  the  dead  drips  with  perils.  I 
feared  them  for  Bradish  who,  at  the  moment,  came 
limping  in. 

Malignantly  he  surveyed  me.  "Rather  had  you,  eh? 
Served  you  right  for  being  so  damned  uncivil.  Never 
saw  you  show  up  worse,  damned  if  I  have,  and  I 
wanted  you  to  sit  in  with  us.  Now  he  won't  have 
you." 

But  that  cup  of  coffee  was  a  trifle  too  strong.  In 
no  circumstances  would  I  have  approached  the  door  and 
there  it  went  slamming  in  my  face.  The  ease  with 
which  the  trick  had  been  turned  made  me  laugh. 

"What  the  devil  are  you  grinning  at?  Do  you  think 
he  can't  do  it?" 

"Do  what?" 

"Break  through." 

Before  answering,  I  helped  myself  to  the  Rotter 
dam  sonata.  Then  I  looked  up  at  him. 

"Given  the  Satanism,  the  occult  knowledge,  together 
with  the  ability  to  employ  it  and,  everything  being 
possible,  perhaps  he  can.  But  the  perils  of  the 
threshold " 

"Damn  the  perils!" 

"Yes,  but  then  they  may  damn  you.  In  the  last  at 
tempt  at  anything  of  the  kind  that  I  know  of,  one  of  the 
participants  was  strangled  to  death  and  another  went 
raving  mad." 

"What  became  of  the  third?" 

Surprised  at  the  question,  I  asked  one.  "How  do 
you  know  there  was  a  third?" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  155 

"The  old  cock  said  there  must  be  three  and,  hang  it, 
I  had  counted  on  you." 

"You  will  have  to  count  again  then.  In  this  instance 
there  were  three.  The  third  escaped  in  time." 

Bradish  gestured.  "Escaped,  did  he,  and  from  what? 
The  effects  of  his  own  imagination.  Otherwise  they 
must  have  botched  it.  From  what  I  understand,  and 
I  propose  to  verify  it,  in  the  course  of  the  ceremonies 
the  door  will  open  and  Nelly  will  appear." 

"Perhaps,"  I  told  him  and  I  told  him,  too,  to  mark 
the  perhaps.  "But,"  I  added,  "supposing  that  instead 
of  the  dead,  there  appear,  as  there  appeared  to  the 
people  I  just  mentioned,  a  materialised  elemental  that 
grapples  with  you,  eats  your  throat  out,  tears  your 
reason  away.  What  happened  to  them,  might  happen 
to  you.  They  also  were  trying  to  evoke  a  dead  girl. 
A  demoniac  incube  came  in  her  place.  For  God's 
sake,  Jim " 

He  shoved  the  gin  at  me.  "Have  another.  We  are 
not  in  Sunday  school." 

I  was  looking  at  him  and,  as  I  looked,  I  had  an  im 
pression,  curious,  abnormal  and  perhaps  unfounded 
that  he  was  obsessed.  In  his  eyes  was  an  expression 
so  evil  and  about  his  mouth  a  twist  so  vile,  that  it  was 
as  though  a  psychical  confiscation  had  occurred  and  I 
was  looking  at  another  being. 

Since  then  I  have  been  through  the  war,  where  I 
learned  what  fear  is;  where  I  learned  also  that  in  the 
presence  of  the  fearful  you  will  falter  if  you  do  not 
laugh.  I  had  not  learned  that  lesson  then.  None  the 
less  I  laughed.  I  laughed  at  him — or  at  it. 

Viciously  he  eyed  me.  Then  at  once,  with  a  shake 
of  the  head,  he  raised  a  hand  and  passed  it  down  over 


156  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

the  face  from  forehead  to  chin.  It  was  as  though  he 
were  wiping,  or  trying  to  wipe,  some  of  the  evil  away. 
But  the  action  may  have  been  entirely  unconscious. 
None  the  less  and  though  the  horrible  expression  re 
mained,  it  had  diminished  and  in  a  moment,  when  he 
again  spoke,  it  seemed  to  leave  him,  sponged  away  by 
an  effort  of  his  own  volition. 

uThe  old  cock  told  me  to  say  to  you  from  him, 
Silence  and  Farewell." 

I  looked  at  my  glass  and  from  it  at  him.  "Very 
considerate.  It  is  the  occultist  leave-taking.  I  do  wish 
he  would  say  it  to  you." 

As  I  said  that,  I  could  have  sworn  that  in  spite  of 
his  efforts,  that  revolting  look,  the  look  of  another 
entity,  glared  out  from  him  at  me. 

He  turned  on  his  heel  and  turned  back. 

"The  car  is  waiting." 

So  too  was  that  look.  I  did  not  laugh  then.  I 
went  on  and  out.  As  I  went  the  look  followed.  In  the 
car,  there  it  was.  It  was  like  a  look  shot  through  the 
keyhole  of  some  door  below. 

XXI 

IN  times  of  stress,  and  this  was  one  of  them,  a 
cultivated  indifference  has  its  value,  but  it  is  perhaps 
less  conducive  to  serenity  than  the  opiates  of  work. 
Resolutely,  on  the  morrow,  I  prepared  to  give  my  pen 
a  skirt  dance  around  that  garbage  flower  of  the  west, 
yet,  such  was  the  stress,  that  it  was  not  until  evening 
that  I  had  it  sufficiently  groomed  for  the  grand  ecart. 
But  what  pen,  however  poor,  can  be  saltitudinous  on 
an  empty  stomach  ?  With  a  view  to  various  vilenesses 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  157 

at  a  cookshop  nearby,  but  accompanied  by  cowpunchers, 
bad  men  and  that  prairie  pearl,  I  was  somnambulistic- 
ally  vacating  the  rookery  when  the  janitor's  drooping 
eye  popped  up  and  a  note  fluttered  at  me. 

Anything  of  the  kind  was  distinctly  forbidden  and 
I  was  about  to  give  him  fits  but  inadvertently  I  had 
looked  at  the  superscription.  Never  before  had  I  seen 
that  writing.  Yet  its  character,  oddly  cobwebby  and 
equally  clear,  was  as  serviceable  as  a  photograph. 

"I  thought  as  how/'  the  dirty  little  man  was  saying, 
"seeing  it  was  her " 

"And  thou  hast  done  well,  my  pretty  maiden.  Here." 

I  fed  a  dollar  into  his  dirty  paw  and  read. 

Would  I  come  and  dine? 

Would  I?  The  bad  men  could  shoot  themselves 
through,  shoot  every  cowpuncher  I  never  saw.  For  all 
I  cared  the  freckled  lily  could  bolt  for  good,  bolt  for 
bad.  A  fairer  flower  was  beckoning  then. 

"Will  come  with  joy  and  leave  with  regret,"  I  scrib 
bled  with  her  address  on  a  card. 

"And  here,"  I  said,  feeding  out  another  dollar. 
"Run  around  to  the  telegraph  shop  and  send  this  at 


once." 


She  is  a  good  sort,  I  presently  remarked  at  my  mir 
ror  as  I  tied  my  white  tie. 

Now,  in  looking  back,  I  remember  that  the  dinner 
was  detestable.  But  though  the  dinner  was  vile,  Aly 
was  delicious.  Not  a  philistine  trace  of  preoccupation, 
no  bourgeois  attempt  at  excuse. 

The  attitude  charmed  me.  Moreover,  as  I  have 
lived  as  lizards  live,  on  sunshine  and  dust,  the  quality 
of  the  dinner  did  not  affect  me  in  the  least.  It  could 
not  have  been  worse,  though  if  it  had  been,  what  could 


158  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

it  have  mattered  since  she  was  there?  Later  I 
learned  that  she  had  left  it  all  to  the  maid.  Thrice 
happy  maid  who,  while  not  the  rose,  yet  lived  nearby. 

Presently  coffee  came.  The  cloth  was  removed  and 
she  played  a  little;  an  air  from  Louise,  the  Depuis 
le  jour;  then  more  perfumery,  Salome's  song  in 
Herodiade.  After  which,  turning  on  the  bench,  she 
looked  at  me. 

"I  think  the  lady  of  the  steps  is  a  Miss  Fellowes." 

"Hello!"  I  exclaimed,  surprised  enough  at  the  sud 
den  entrance  of  the  young  woman  I  had  pitched  in  the 
street. 

From  the  bench  she  moved  nearer.  "You  know  of 
a  Miss  Fellowes?" 

"Why,  when  was  it?  The  day  after  I  brought  you 
back  here,  I  looked  in  at  a  club  where  a  gay  sort  of  ass, 
a  chap  named  Brevoort,  told  me  of  a  Miss  Fellowes 
who  ran  off  with  a  chauffeur." 

"The  gay  young  man  told  you  something  else." 

"He  certainly  did.  He  said  she  was  a  cousin  of 
Nelly  Chilton." 

"And  looked  like  her?" 

"He  thought  her  her  ghost." 

Aly  laughed.     "He  must  be  a  dear." 

"But,"  I  asked,  "why  do  you  think  she  is  the  lady 
of  the  steps?" 

"I  happened  to  see  her  and  the  probability  occurred 


to  me." 


"It  occurred  to  me  that  the  lady  of  the  steps  was 
you  and,  if  I  had  not  known  that  at  the  time  you  were 
in  Canada,  it  would  have  occurred  to  me  that  you  were 
Brevoort's  ghost;  or  no,  not  his  ghost,  the  ghost  he 
thought  he  saw," 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  159 

"I  am  glad  to  be  acquitted." 

"But  your  innocence  is  not  a  proof  of  this  other  girl's 
guilt.  I  don't  think  it  was  she  at  all." 

"Whom  do  you  think  it  was?" 

"Some  fair  unknown  who  possessed  the  extraordi 
nary  advantage  of  resembling  both  you  and  Nelly 
Chilton." 

"Why  then  may  it  not  be  this  Miss  Fellowes?" 

"Well,  you  see,  don't  you  know,  in  view  of  the  chauf 
feur  she  must  be  considerably  out  of  it.  Brevoort 
said  she  had  not  been  seen  or  heard  of  since  she  danced 
the  pas  de  quoi." 

"Well?" 

"Well,  then,  when  Bradish  hailed  her  as  his  Nelly, 
she  would  not  have  known  him  from  Adam  and  as  a 
consequence  could  not  have  retorted,  'Your  Nelly  is 
dead.'  " 

From  the  silver  box  Aly  Bolton  took  a  cigarette, 
lighted  it,  blew  a  ring  of  smoke,  ran  a  finger  through 
it  and,  incidentally,  through  my  argument. 

"Mr.  Bradish  is  known  to  all  New  York.  Miss 
Fellowes  cannot  be  more  out  of  it  than  I  am  and  yet 
the  first  time  I  saw  him  I  knew  at  once  who  he  was." 

"But  my  dear  young  woman.    When " 

"Don't  be  so  violent.  I  am  not  your  dear  young 
woman." 

"My  hated  young  woman  then.  When  you  saw 
Bradish  in  the  Park,  if  he  had  hailed  you  as  his  Nelly, 
I  will  wager  a  bag  of  ducats  you  would  not  have  as 
sumed  a  sainte  n'y  louche  attitude  and  told  him  what 
he  knew." 

"Yes,  but,  and  to  borrow  your  own  mode  of  expres 
sion,  you  see,  don't  you  know,  Miss  Fellowes  may  be 


160  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

more  conversational.  Then  also,  and  however  the 
chauffeur  may  have  disconnected  her,  none  the  less  she 
is  one  of  the  family  and  if  she  read  the  papers  she 
would  have  known  that  her  cousin  had  married  and 
died." 

"Where  did  you  see  her?"  I  suddenly  remembered 
to  ask. 

"In  the  street." 

uHow  did  you  know  she  was  Miss  Fellowes?" 

"I  did  not  know.  I  had  never  heard  of  Miss  Fel 
lowes.  But  when  I  saw  her  I  stopped  and  said,  'This 
is  Mrs.  Bradish,  is  it  not?'  and  she  said,  no,  she  was 
Miss  Fellowes." 

"Like  that !  Without  showing  surprise  or  anything? 
Forgive  me.  I  don't  get  the  atmosphere." 

"It  was  today.  I  was  passing  the  cathedral.  She 
was  coming  out.  I  stopped  and  spoke.  She  seemed 
annoyed,  if  anything.  Then  I  saw  she  had  a  man  with 
her.  If  I  had  known  she  was  not  alone,  I  would  not 
have  spoken  at  all." 

"The  chauffeur  perhaps?" 

"I  can't  tell  you.  I  had  but  a  glimpse  of  him.  I 
should  say  he  was  fifty  and  probably  English.  He  did 
not  look  like  a  chauffeur.  This  man  looked  like  a 
viceroy.  He  had  the  grand  air." 

"We  can  bury  the  chauffeur  then.  But  after  she 
spoke,  did  she  vanish?" 

"Yes,  in  a  cab." 

"And  before  that.  How  did  she  look?  Brevoort 
said  she  was  ghastly." 

"Her  skin  was  the  colour  of  lard.  I  could  feel  that 
she  had  suffered  and  suffered  acutely.  Yet  then,  an 
impression  of  that  kind  I  often  get.  Perhaps  people 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  161 

are  not  always  as  debonair  as  they  seem.  But  I  had 
still  another  impression,  that  she  was  preoccupied  about 
something.  What,  I  cannot  say.  I  might  have  picked 
her  mind,  but  that,  except  when  the  picking  is  involun 
tary,  I  never  do.  Yet  there  is  something  that  she  is 
keeping  to  herself.  Of  that  I  am  sure.  I  am  sure, 
too,  some  day  it  will  be  known.  Unfortunately  for  us 
all,  sooner  or  later  any  secret  we  may  have  is  bared." 

Then  for  a  while  we  discussed  it,  she  maintaining 
that  Bradish  should  be  told,  I  maintaining  that  it  would 
not  matter  now  and  relating  the  incidents  of  the  night 
before. 

"I  know  the  magus  by  repute,"  she  said  at  last. 
"His  rags  are  a  masquerade.  If  he  is  paid  to  open 
that  door,  he  will.  What  he  finds  behind  it  is  another 
matter." 

I  stood  up.  "You  tell  me  that  sooner  or  later  all 
secrets  will  be  bared?" 

She  must  have  seen  it  coming,  for  she  called  to  her 
ostentatious  cat. 

But  I  did  not  propose  to  have  Signer  Matouchi  inter 
fere  and  I  put  it  to  her. 

"When  will  mine  be  bared?" 

Sagely  she  replied:   "When  its  hour  comes." 

"That  is  not  very  comforting.  I  always  picture  the 
future  as  a  greenroom  of  which  the  stage-manager  is 
Time.  The  hours  he  motions  to  beset  our  lives  are 
sad  enough,  but  sadder  still  are  those  that  are  yet  to 


come." 


Quickly  she  looked  at  me.  "Do  you  not  think  that 
that  depends  on  ourselves?  It  is  not  the  hours  that  are 
sad,  it  is  we  that  sadden  them." 


1 62  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

As  quickly  I  looked  at  her.  "Bil  Sayers  said  that. 
It  is  in  The  Dawn" 

She  gave  me  her  hand.  "Yes,  I  was  quoting  from 
it.  Perhaps  it  is  not  very  profound." 

"Less  profound  than  your  eyes,"  I  replied.  "When 
you  quote  to  me,  quote  to  me  with  them." 

Tolerably  banal,  I  resumed  to  myself  when  I  was 
at  last  in  the  street.  Why  is  it,  when  a  man  is  in  love, 
he  talks  like  a  fool? 


XXII 

WHETHER  the  western  garbage-lily  bolted  or  not,  is 
certainly  immaterial.  In  any  event,  so  many  amazing 
incidents  intervened  that  it  was  some  time  before  my 
pen  could  pirouette  before  her.  The  quick  lariat  of 
her  slang,  the  astonishing  grace  with  which  she  leaped 
on  a  horse  from  behind,  the  aura  of  purity  that  carried 
her  on  a  piebald  mustang  unspotted  through  the  ma 
chinations  of  the  worst  men  in  the  bad  lands,  for  these 
virginal  acrobatics  my  publishers  had  to  wait. 

Another  young  woman,  the  girl  I  had  pitched  in  the 
street,  primarily  detained  me.  Pictured  by  Aly,  she 
differed  from  the  ghost  that  Brevoort  had  pursued  and 
although,  the  night  before,  when  she  so  surprisingly 
appeared,  I  could  not  take  her  seriously,  yet,  such  are 
the  clarifying  processes  of  sleep,  that  it  seemed  to  me 
Bradish  should  be  shown  the  composite  view.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  she  must  be  the  lady  of  the  steps. 
It  seemed  to  me  also  that  since  she  had  a  name,  she 
must  have  also  a  local  habitation. 

Apart  from  which  I  was  curious  about  him.  The 
evil  look  in  his  eyes,  the  ugly  twist  to  his  mouth,  the 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  163 

highly  uncomfortable  idea  of  psychic  confiscation,  these 
impressions  lingered,  but  only  after  the  manner  of 
nightmares  that  day  has  dispersed.  I  had  been  con 
scious  of  them.  They  had  disturbed  me.  But  after 
thought  had  induced  the  idea  that  they  were  due  to 
the  malign  influence  of  that  Eblian  rat,  or  else — and 
what  was  less  fantastic  and  more  reasonable — to  my 
own  attempt  at  interference  and  the  hostility  to  the 
vermin  that  I  had  displayed. 

Moreover,  in  the  same  manner  that  the  strength 
and  precision  of  my  own  impressions  had  diminished, 
it  seemed  to  me  that  his  own  impressions  might  have 
lost  their  force,  that  I  might  find  him,  not  as  he  had 
been,  but  perhaps  less  tedious  than  latterly  he  had  be 
come.  Ever  since  the  vision  on  the  steps,  he  had  been 
tiresome  as  only  a  self-centred  invalid  can  be.  For  he 
was  an  invalid,  mentally  at  least,  with  whose  tedious- 
ness  it  was,  no  doubt,  my  duty  to  bear. 

It  is  true  that  when  a  duty  is  not  a  joy  I  have  shirked 
it  and  shirk  it  I  always  shall.  The  doing  your  duty 
for  duty's  sake  seems  to  me  sanctimonious  cant.  There 
ought  to  be  joy  in  everything.  There  should  be  joy 
in  that  and  not  the  sense  of  severe  satisfaction  which 
some  people  appear  to  get  out  of  it.  Anyway,  brain- 
workers  are  different.  Brainworkers  represent  a  spe 
cial  form  of  life.  For  them  to  suffer  themselves  to  be 
depressed  is  immoral. 

It  was  with  these  Confucianisms  in  mind  that  I  ap 
proached  the  great  white  staring  house.  Occupied  as 
I  was  with  them,  I  did  not  immediately  notice  Peters. 
He  had  come  out  from  the  basement  before  I  saw  him 
and  then,  to  my  amusement,  I  heard  him  urge  me  to 
go  away. 


1 64  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Yet  at  once  he  must  have  thought  better  of  it,  incom 
prehensibly  better,  for  he  backed  into  an  area,  invisible 
from  the  upper  windows,  where  he  effected  a  dumb- 
show  that  would  have  been  good  business  in  my  panto 
mime.  His  face,  ordinarily  wooden,  was  as  full  of 
expression  as  a  Chinese  mask  and  that,  phenomenal 
as  it  is  in  an  English  servant,  decided  me.  I  marched 
in  to  where  he  was. 

"Pardon  me,  sir,  but  Mr.  Bradish's  orders  are  that 
no  one  is  to  be  admitted  and  Mr.  Bradish  particularly 
mentioned  you,  sir." 

I  looked  at  him  and  pulled  at  my  nose. 

At  that,  he  clapped  a  hand  to  his  mouth. 

Immediately  several  things  occurred  to  me.  I  real 
ised  that  the  grand  Satanic  seance  was  being  held  and 
that  a  man,  straight  as  a  grenadier  and  perhaps  equally 
strong,  was  afraid  of  something  which  he  did  not  under 
stand.  At  the  same  time,  I  realised  also  that  while 
courage  is  often  the  result  of  an  entire  absence  of 
imagination,  quite  as  often  ignorance  is  the  most  potent 
factor  of  fear.  Yet  as  I  doubted  that  Peters  had  ever 
heard  of  the  demoniac  polka  and  as  I  was  sure  it  would 
be  too  much  for  him  if  he  had,  I  invented  a  palpable 
explanation,  but,  before  producing  it,  I  thought  that 
for  once  he  ought  to  have  his  say  and  I  gave  him 
the  cue. 

"What  the  devilis  all  this?" 

I  could  see  him  jumping  at  it.     His  hand  dropped. 

"I  don't  know,  sir.  As  God  is  my  witness  I  don't. 
But  have  you  noticed  the  windows,  sir?  All  darkened, 
everyone  in  the  'ouse,  even  to  those  at  the  back  and 
here  in  the  basement.  That  isn't  all;  no,  sir.  The 
furniture  taken  out  of  the  drawing-room,  every  stick  of 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  165 

it,  and  a  fire  burning  there,  a  fire  all  night,  and  Mr. 
Bradish  in  there  with  two  men.  Yesterday  a  man 
came  in  a  closed  carnage,  he  is  one  of  'em.  That  man 
as  was  here  the  night  you  were,  sir,  he's  been  in  the 
'ouse  ever  since  and  he's  another  and  there  are  two 
lambs.  The  man  as  came  in  the  carriage  he  fetched 
them  and  a  copper  pot  big  enough  to  boil  'em  both." 

The  witches'  cauldron,  I  thought,  and  I  thought  too, 
whoever  wrote  Macbeth  knew  what  he  was  writing 
about. 

"And  no  one  allowed  in  since  then,  sir,  and  none  of 
us  allowed  out.  Gedney,  he's  at  the  side  door.  I  am 
here  and  Fletcher  is  at  the  back.  Mr.  Bradish  hasn't 
eaten  anything,  not  one  of  'em  has,  not  a  crust,  and 
we  are  none  of  us  allowed  above  the  basement  floor 
and  what  they  are  doing  there  with  that  pot  and  those 
lambs  and  in  the  dark,  God  'elp  me,  sir,  I  don't  know." 

"It  is  very  simple,"  I  said.  "Just  a  little  ceremony 
in  commemoration  of  the  landing  here  of  the  first 
cargo  of  schnapps.  All  good  Knickerbockers  piously 
observe  it.  Nothing  to  concern  yourself  about.  No 
ticed  any  wind  yet?" 

"Wind,  sir?  In  the  'ouse?  With  the  windows  all 
closed!" 

"Well,  if  you  do,  pay  no  attention.  It  will  be  over 
shortly.  It'll  stop  by  tomorrow." 

Whereupon,  with  something  to  think  of,  I  turned  on 
my  heel  and,  in  passing,  glanced  up  at  the  house  which, 
with  the  windows  closed  and  the  blinds  so  drawn  that 
not  a  ray  of  light  could  enter,  looked  both  sepulchral 
and  hermetic.  But  only  to  me.  A  passer  who  thought 
of  it  at  all,  would  have  thought  merely  that  the  owner 
was  away. 


1 66  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

And  yet  would  he?  Not  if  he  were  the  least  psychic. 
For  about  the  great  white  staring  house,  there  was  a 
sensation  of  chill,  a  savour  of  things  damned,  an  im 
pression  of  space,  of  shapes  of  sin,  of  monstrous  crimes, 
of  sacrilege  and  sorcery. 

And  yet,  I  reflected — and  reflected,  too,  very  erro 
neously — if  an  ordinary  passer  had  succeeded  in  looking 
in,  he  could  have  witnessed  nothing  more  than  the 
mummeries  of  three  men  in  a  darkened  room  where, 
set  in  a  circle  marked  by  cabalistic  designs,  stood  a 
tripod  topped  by  a  pot  full  of  blood,  before  which  one 
of  the  men,  turning  and  bending  to  the  north  and  south, 
was  invoking  enigmatic  beings,  calling  to  them  in  words 
rhythmic  and  unprintable.  But  nothing  else,  nothing 
whatever,  except  what  the  normal  eye  could  not  detect, 
a  crew  of  elementals  swarming  in  a  wind  that  swept 
through  the  dismantled  room  and  tore  along  the  hall 
ways  of  the  empty  house. 

That  would  be  all,  unless  the  passer  lingered,  in 
which  case  he  might  behold  a  vapour  rising  from  the 
cauldron,  a  vapour  that  wavered,  ascended,  descended, 
expanded  and,  gradually  solidifying,  assumed  a  human 
shape;  the  form  of  a  girl  translucently  beautiful,  im 
mortally  pale.  If,  after  that,  he  did  not  shriek  and 
run  away,  it  would  be  because  he  was  a  brave  man  and 
lacked  imagination. 

Certainly  I,  too,  lacked  it.  There  was  far  more 
for  that  imbecile  to  see  than  I  saw  for  him.  There 
were  rites  curiously  revolting,  a  ritual  of  perverted 
horror,  all  the  turpitudes  of  the  black  mass  accentuated 
by  the  infamies  of  black  magic.  Of  that  I  did  not 
learn  until  later. 

At  the  time,  in  picturing  pictures  for  my  imaginary 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  167 

passer,  I  had  entered  the  Park  where  I  found  a  bench 
free  from  nursemaids  and  babies.  There  the  trees, 
the  green,  the  grass,  distracted  me.  I  thought  of  hills 
and  dales  and  winding  lanes.  I  love  the  country  when 
I  am  not  in  it.  Wearily  a  squirrel  eyed  me  and  gingerly 
approached.  I  stretched  my  hand.  A  ball  of  fur  and 
nothing!  The  squirrel  had  evaporated  as  suddenly  as 
the  lady  of  the  steps.  My  thoughts  went  back  to  her, 
from  her  to  Bradish,  and  I  wondered.  The  always 
possible  possibility  of  his  becoming  insane  occurred 
to  me,  as  it  had  occurred  before.  In  those  shadowy 
halls  of  his,  Lyssa,  goddess  of  the  mad,  goddess,  too, 
of  the  elect,  stood  and  waited.  I  could  picture  her 
also,  picture  her  fanning  him  with  her  harlequin  wings, 
binding  him  with  her  opal  chains. 

And  for  what?  The  tenuous  theory  of  sins  anterior 
and  forgotten  returned,  but  the  immediate  cause  was 
clearer.  He  had  everything,  except  one  thing  only. 
Certainly  he  was  not  Adonis.  But  what  of  it?  When 
you  are  rich  as  Croesus,  though  how  rich  Croesus  may 
have  been  I  have  no  idea,  yet  when  you  are,  then  were 
your  nose  as  big  as  a  pillow  and  your  face  an  open 
wound,  always  there  are  attractive  women  to  call  you 
Dear.  You  cannot  keep  them  away  with  a  club. 

That  was  not  enough  for  Jim  Bradish.  A  dead  girl, 
who  had  been  in  love  with  another  man,  was  shoving 
him  deeper  and  deeper  into  the  shadowy  halls,  beck 
oning  to  Lyssa,  calling  to  her,  telling  her  to  take  him 
and  bind  him  and  hide  him  away. 

What  a  fool!  I  reflected.  What  a  bloody  fool  any 
man  is  who  wants  more  than  peace,  fresh  linen,  a  cigar 
ette  and  a  book !  I  thought  of  Aly.  As  addition  to  the 
little  inventory  I  wanted  her.  But  I  knew,  well  enough, 


1 68  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

she  did  not  want  me.  If  she  had  wanted  me,  and  I 
could  have  kept  my  head,  I  might  have  said,  Refuse 
me  everything. 

Then  along  the  path  before  me  came  Marguerite 
of  Navarre.  She  nodded,  stopped,  smiled,  tapped  me 
with  her  fan  and  said:  "Si  vous  voulez  cesser  d*  aimer, 
possedez  la  chose  aimee." 

Or  did  I  dream  it?  Like  the  squirrel  she  had  gone 
and  I  was  back  at  those  halls,  at  the  window  there, 
looking  in  at  the  unholy  horrors  that  they  held,  and 
again  I  wondered.  Yet  there  was  nothing  earthly  I 
could  do,  except  prime  Cally  who  never  needed  priming. 

I  might  adventure  that  way,  I  thought,  submit  a 
hypothetical  case  and  get  my  bearings. 

On  I  went.  At  his  house,  a  servant  told  me  it 
was  not  the  doctor's  office  hour. 

"So  much  the  better  then.    Take  my  hat  and  stick." 

The  negro  backed  but  he  rallied.     "He  isn't  in." 

I  turned  on  my  heel  and  was  going  up  the  street  when 
I  saw  Cally  affecting  to  hide  behind  a  lamppost. 

I  stood  and  looked  at  him. 

"Well,"  he  said,  pretending  to  pretend  that  he  had 
not  been  there.  "I  saw  the  literary  light  at  my  door. 
Highly  effulgent.  I've  read  your  last  book." 

"You  must  have  been  very  idle.  See  here,  I  have  a 
conundrum  for  you.  What  would  you  do  if  a  patient 
went  mad?  Rob  him?" 

"I  would  cure  him  first.  Thinking  of  Bradish,  eh? 
You  need  not.  There  is  not  a  possibility  of  it.  He's 
not  a  genius.  If  he  were  like  you  now " 

"Or  you." 

"Always  the  retort  courteous.  Poole,  you  are  the 
most  engaging  man  I  know.  Come  on  in  and  smoke 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  169 

a  small  cigar.  I  won't  offer  you  a  big  one.  I  haven't 
the  time." 

At  his  office,  he  abandoned  me  in  a  dismal  den  where, 
as  I  kicked  my  heels,  I  reflected  that  since  he  was  as 
confident  about  Bradish  as  all  that,  not  only  it  was 
idle  to  bother  but  it  would  be  beastly  of  me  to  tell 
tales  out  of  school. 

These  meditations  were  interrupted.  Cally  returned 
cigarless.  He  had  no  cigars,  he  told  me,  and  took  one 
of  mine  which,  hang  him,  he  seemed  to  enjoy.  As  he 
pulled  at  it  a  remark  he  had  made  the  last  time  I  saw 
him  occurred  to  me,  and,  with  an  eye  to  copy,  I  prod 
ded  him. 

"What  about  that  interesting  case?" 

"Which  one?" 

"You  said  George  Eliot  had  written  about  some 
thing  similar." 

"Yaas,  I  remember  now.  When  I  mentioned  it  I 
had  just  come  from  the  g.p.  It  was  a  case  of  catalepsy. 
Could  you  use  that?" 

"Hardly.  Too  much  of  an  hors  d'ceuwe.  The  public 
wants  roast  beef  and  boiled  potatoes.  But  though  I 
can't  feed  out  catalepsy,  I'll  take  a  bite  of  it  myself." 

"Sorry.  Impossible  to  serve  it  today.  It  will  keep 
though.  Let  me  see.  If  you  are  still  hungry,  look  in 
on  Sunday." 

But  a  man  capable  of  that  cigar  trick  was  capable 
of  anything,  and  I  shied,  little  thinking  how  soon  and 
how  desperately  I  was  to  rush  to  him  for  aid. 


i yo  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

XXIII 

I  FELT  quite  the  loafer  when,  after  leaving  tricky 
little  Cally,  I  entered  the  club  where  other  chaps  looked 
as  I  felt.  Mainly  polo  men,  they  were  healthy,  inno 
cent-minded  young  animals  to  whom  a  purveyor  of 
cheap  fiction  was  one  of  the  literati,  a  being  to  be 
treated  with  respect  and  avoided  with  care.  None 
the  less,  at  the  window  where  they  sat,  they  made 
room  for  me,  swapped  stories  with  each  other,  stories 
as  innocent  as  themselves,  and  yet  told  with  such  a 
flourish  of  By  George !  and  I  tell  you !  with  such  shrieks 
of  laughter  and  such  unfathomable  good  fellowship, 
that  I  will  be  shot  if  I  did  not  begin  to  feel  as  innocent 
as  they  and  went  with  them  on  and  up  to  dinner,  a  noisy 
catch-as-catch-can  sort  of  an  affair,  at  which  some  of 
them  became  a  bit  superhilarious,  but  where  I  kept 
my  head. 

I  can  truthfully  testify  to  that  because  of  subsequent 
events  which  even  now  I  vividly  recall.  The  polo  chaps 
were  all  to  be  off  on  the  morrow,  for  a  match  some 
where  or  other,  at  Point  Judith  I  think,  but,  for  the 
evening,  they  had  planned  to  go  to  a  roof  and  as  in  the 
interim  I  had  talked  not  shop  but  horses,  their  respect 
for  the  literati  had  so  measurably  diminished  that  they 
were  for  having  me  chip  in.  I  agreed  of  course  and 
then  managed  to  lose  them,  after  which  I  went  on  and 
up  to  the  temporary  temple  of  Beelzebub. 

Beelzebub  or,  more  exactly,  Baal  Zebub,  a  Syrian 
demon,  was  lord  of  flies  and,  I  remember  thinking  at 
the  time,  possibly  lord  of  fireflies  also.  For  the  temple, 
previously  dark,  was  bright.  Through  curtains  at  the 
windows  came  the  gleam  of  electric  bulbs  and  it  oc- 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  171 

curred  to  me  that  in  the  great  dining-hall  a  feast  was 
in  progress,  an  infernal  orgy,  at  which  to  the  right 
and  left  of  Satan's  legate,  sat  the  quick  and  the  dead; 
that  there,  with  that  saffron  monster  of  a  magus,  were 
bride  and  groom;  Nelly  Chilton  summoned  from  her 
grave  and  Bradish  conjecturing  the  chill  raptures  of 
her  bloodless  lips,  the  frigid  emptiness  of  her  ghostly 
arms,  the  renewed  and  spectral  wedding. 

I  thought  of  that,  of  more  too  I  dare  say,  as  I  stood 
on  the  stoop.  But  at  once  the  door  opened.  Gedney 
was  there.  Beyond  was  Peters.  On  the  stair  was 
Bradish. 

uHey!"  he  threw  at  me. 

Gedney  took  my  hat  and  stick.  He  seemed  catlike 
as  ever.  From  Peters  the  Chinese  mask  had  been 
lifted.  His  face  was  as  dumb  as  before.  But  on 
that  stair,  Bradish  had  an  air  and  an  expression  so 
reassuring  that  it  upset  me. 

"Gedney,  take  Mr.  Poole's  orders." 

In  the  Park  I  had  dreamed  that  Marguerite  de 
Navarre  addressed  me.  On  the  stair,  Bradish  seemed 
equally  unaccountable.  What  I  had  really  expected,  I 
do  not  remember  but  I  suppose  it  was  the  unexpected. 
Well,  there  it  was.  Instead  of  odours  of  the  black 
mass  and  savours  of  a  satanic  feast,  the  normal  con 
fronted  me  and  such  was  my  mental  somersault,  such 
rather  are  the  abysses  of  human  nature,  that  finding 
the  banal  where  I  had  awaited  the  demoniac,  I  stran 
gled  an  oath. 

"Come  on  in  here,"  Bradish  was  saying. 

Vacating  the  stair,  he  indicated  the  library.  There 
again  I  looked  at  him.  The  evil  that  had  been  in  his 
eyes,  the  ugly  twist  about  his  mouth,  the  suggestions  of 


172  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

an  alien  and  obsessing  entity  that  he  had  exhaled,  these 
malignities  had  gone.  Even  the  spider  had  diminished. 
It  was  no  longer  crimson  but  dull,  lifeless  as,  in  the 
old  days,  it  used  to  be. 

Reassured  as  to  that,  but  vastly  perplexed,  I  let  fly. 

"I  was  here  at  noon  and  could  not  get  in.  You  were 
closeted  with  that  rat  I  suppose.  Where  is  he?" 

He  half  raised  a  hand.  "I  don't  know.  I  don't 
care.  But  I  can  tell  you  this,  he  did  it." 

Now,  though,  Gedney,  with  his  catlike  tread,  was 
coming  in. 

In  my  bewilderment,  not  at  him,  but  at  what  Bradish 
had  said,  I  flopped  in  a  chair. 

"It  cost  me  a  pretty  penny,  I  can  tell  you  that  also, 
but  I  can  tell  you,  too,  it  was  uncommonly  cheap." 

Gedney  had  gone  and  I  reached  for  one  of  the  sere 
nades  he  had  brought. 

"Then  the  door  was  opened?" 

"Well,"  he  surprisingly  replied,  "that  depends  on 
how  you  look  at  it." 

"But  as  yet,"  I  angrily  protested,  "I  don't  know 
how  to  look  or  what  to  look  at.  Either  the  Satanism 
succeeded  or  it  did  not.  Which  was  it?" 

"It  did  both." 

At  that,  and  feeling  perhaps  that  only  spirit  forces 
could  sustain  me,  I  emptied  my  glass. 

He  was  still  standing,  but  coming  to  the  table  he 
poured  out  a  little  gin,  watered  it  discreetly,  sat  down 
and  sipped.  He  sipped  with  the  comfortable  air  of  an 
old  woman  drinking  tea. 

I  do  not  know  why  that  should  have  angered  me  fur 
ther,  but  he  seemed  so  entirely  at  his  ease  that  I  barked. 

"See  here.    I  hate  rows  unless  I  make  them  myself." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  173 

He  looked  over  his  glass  at  me.     "Yes?" 
I  nodded  at  him.     "I  can  promise  you  this,  there 
will  be  one  unless  you  stop  beating  about  the  bush." 
"There  was  a  bush,  but  it's  gone.     She's  alive." 
"Alive!     What  are  you  talking  about?" 
He  put  down  the  glass.     "About  Nelly  of  course 
and  I  always  knew  it.    From  the  start  I  knew  it.    From 
the  moment  I  woke  up  and  saw  that  nurse  looking  at 
me,  I  did  not  believe  that  anything  had  happened  at 
all.     Afterward  I  realised  that  I  had  been  hurt  and 
that  Mike  was  dead  and  I  was  sorry  enough  about 
that.    But,  as  for  Nelly,  I  never  believed  it.    All  gam 
mon  and  spinach,  that's  what  I  thought  it.    I  have  told 
you  so  time  and  again." 

I  had  it  at  last.  Long  since  overstrained,  the  Satan 
ism  had  unhinged  him.  The  man  was  demented,  there 
fore  to  be  humoured  and  I  nodded  again,  this  time 
pleasantly  enough  and  soothingly  answered,  "Of 
course,  of  course." 

He  sipped  again.  "Yes,  today  the  magus  confirmed 
it.  He  and  I  and  an  occultist  that  he  had  in,  engaged 
in  an  enterprise  that  was  frankly  revolting.  In  that 
room  across  the  hall  things  were  done  that  made  my 
flesh  creep.  There  were  others  that  nauseated  me. 
There  was  a  sort  of  double  shuffle,  the  crapulous  and 
the  sanguinary  heel-and-toeing  with  the  invisible.  I 
throw  a  veil  over  it  and  all  the  more  readily  because  I 
swore  I  would.  Apart  from  that,  there  were  influences 
about,  influences  that  had  come  or  been  loosed  there. 
What  they  were  is  beyond  me.  I  could  not  see  them, 
but  I  felt  them.  It  was  as  though  a  lot  of  bats  were 
swarming  about  me  in  the  dark.  It  was  ignoble  and 
it  was  horrible.  But  there  was  nothing  more,  or 


174  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

rather  there  was  nothing  else.  The  fact  that  there 
was  nothing  more  threw  the  old  cock  in  a  fury.  He 
spluttered  at  me  like  a  hellcat.  I  got  it  out  of  him  then. 
Nelly  did  not  appear  because  she  could  not  appear  and 
could  not  appear  because  she  is  alive." 

I  smiled  and  said  nothing.  What  was  there  to  say? 
But  in  smiling  I  revised  my  inexpert  diagnosis.  Brad- 
ish  was  not  mad;  he  was  far  worse,  he  was  silly. 

"Yes,"  he  resumed,  "how  could  she  materialise  when 
she  was  material  already?  But  the  old  cock  did  not 
stop  there.  He  cursed  and  swore  that  I  had  inveigled 
him  into  attempting  to  evoke  a  spirit  that  was  not  a 
spirit,  that  I  knew  was  not  a  spirit  and  I  had  done  it 
out  of  vulgar  curiosity,  to  see  what  could  be  evoked, 
an  act,  he  said,  that  might  have  been  mortally  disas 
trous  to  all  concerned.  His  adjutant  was  as  spluttery 
as  he." 

And  that  was  the  way  he  wriggled  out  of  it,  I 
thought.  But  I  said,  "I  don't  suppose  they  fell  on 
you  tooth  and  nail." 

As  Bradish  could  have  knocked  their  heads  together, 
knocked  the  heads  of  a  dozen  like  them,  the  supposition 
was  extravagant.  He  took  it  gravely. 

"They  were  viperish  enough  for  anything  and  though 
I  paid  them  what  I  had  promised,  they  reviled  me  in 
terms  that  at  least  had  the  merit  of  being  new.  I 
naturally  protested  that " 

"I  dare  say  you  did,"  I  interrupted.  "But  not  that 
you  had  been  rooked.  You  were  plucked  like  a  pigeon. 
Those  rats  knew  beforehand  that  there  would  be  no 
materialisation  and  worked  on  your  credulity  after 
planning  to  put  the  failure  and  the  burden  of  it  on  you." 

"No,  not  at  all.    Their  rage  was  not  feigned.    Rats 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  175 

they  may  be.  They  are  not  Salvinis.  When  I  pro 
tested  that  it  had  been  formally  certified  to  me  that  my 
wife  was  dead  and  that  she  had  been  put  in  a  vault 
at  Chilton  Manor,  the  magus  spat  at  me,  'Go  and 
look.'  " 

"The  only  sensible  thing  that  has  come  from  him. 
I  wish  you  would.  Go  tomorrow.  The  day  after,  loan 
me  Peters  for  an  hour  and  we  can  start  for  Spain." 

"I  shall  go  tomorrow  and  you  will  go  with  me." 

"Nothing  of  the  kind.  I  have  had  enough  of  this 
tomfoolery.  Take  Peters,  or  take  Gedney,  or  take 
both.  They  can  help  you  shift  things  about  but  I 
won't.  Besides,  you  won't  need  to  shift  anything.  The 
coffin  is  at  the  entrance,  on  the  right.  Get  the  door 
open  and  you  will  find  it." 

"There  is  always  a  door,  isn't  there?  Well,  I  will 
open  this  one." 

"You  have  not  opened  any  yet  and  when  you  do  open 
this  one  you  won't  want  to  open  any  more.  But  for  the 
Lord's  sake  get  it  over  tomorrow.  Then,  hurrah  for 
Spain!" 

"I  am  not  going  to  Spain.     I  shall  look  for  Nelly." 

"Well  then,  after  looking  in  Hades,  you  can  hunt 
through  heaven." 

"I  shall  go  about,"  he  unheedingly  continued,  "I 
shall " 

"Meet  Miss  Fellowes,"  I  put  in. 

"What?"  he  put  back. 

"Mrs.  Chilton's  niece.    Ever  hear  of  her?" 

"What  are  you  bringing  her  in  for?" 

"The  other  day  Brevoort  said  he  had  seen  her  some 
where.  In  a  shop,  I  think." 


1 76  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"He  was  drunk.  She  has  not  been  in  this  country 
for  years." 

"She  might  have  returned." 

"When  she  was  quite  young  she  ran  away  with  a 
green-grocer,  or  was  it  a  groom?  I  have  forgotten. 
Anyway  she  ran  away  from  him,  ran  over  to  Europe 
where  she  has  been  running  ever  since.  Mrs.  Chilton 
told  me." 

"Did  she  say  she  looked  like  her  daughter?" 

"Like  Nelly?    No.    Why  do  you  ask?" 

"I  thought  she  might  be  the  lady  of  the  steps." 

"That  was  Nelly  herself." 

"I  won't  argue  over  it.  But  hadn't  she  any  other 
cousins?  There  must  be  other  Fellowes  hereabouts." 

"A  lot  of  bores  also.  If  you  have  anything  up  your 
sleeve,  out  with  it,  but  don't  sit  there  asking  stupid 
questions.  You  make  me  nervous." 

I  gave  it  to  him  then  about  Aly's  little  adventure, 
about  her,  "This  is  Mrs.  Bradish?"  and  of  the  vexed, 
"No,  I  am  Miss  Fellowes." 

I  could  see  him  taking  it  in,  see  him  turning  it  over 
and  I  capped  it. 

"You  may  be  sure  that  some  Miss  Fellowes  or  other 
is  the  lady  of  the  steps." 

But  in  turning  it,  he  must  have  seen  something  else. 
He  threw  it  back  at  me. 

"No,  all  that  is  sheer  nonsense." 

He  lifted  his  glass  and  I  looked  in  mine.  In  it 
floated  the  earlier  surprises,  the  amazement  I  had  ex 
perienced  when,  on  entering  the  house,  I  had  been  met, 
not  by  the  sound  of  shaken  bells,  the  muffled  riot  of 
a  Satanic  orgy  and  the  spectacle  of  the  spectre  bride, 
but  by  the  numbing  fingers  of  the  commonplace. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  177 

From  the  infernal  to  the  banal,  how  brief  the 
bridge !  At  that  platitude,  the  memory  of  a  verse  from 
the  one  American  writer  who  could  have  adequately 
pictured  the  episode  recurred  to  me  and  I  misquoted  it. 

'  'Is  all  we  feel  or  think  or  seem, 
But  a  dream  within  a  dream  ?'  " 

"What  are  you  mumbling?"  he  asked. 

But  I  had  had  enough.  I  left  him  to  his  morrow, 
little  suspecting  that  there  also  Poe  would  have  been 
of  use. 

XXIV 

IN  and  out  of  the  hall  when,  on  that  morrow,  I 
returned  there,  were  wiry,  aproned  men  whom  Peters 
directed  in  the  task  of  re-establishing  the  black  and  yel 
low  room  as  it  had  been  before  the  parlour  game  of  hide 
and  go  seek. 

Mr.  Bradish,  he  told  me,  was  motoring  and  would  I 
wait,  sir?  Of  his  experiences  and  presumable  emo 
tions  since  he  unburdened  himself  in  the  area,  not  a 
word.  An  automaton  was  before  me.  The  man  had 
gone. 

It  was  after  six  then  and  in  the  library  I  renewed 
my  acquaintance  with  Hugo's  Orient  ales,  in  which  to 
the  hum  of  mandolins,  the  poet  leads  you  through  the 
Andalusia  that  he  knew  and  sang. 

"Yes,  sir,  Mr.  Poole  is  in  the  library.    Thank  you, 


sir." 


In  the  silent  house,  deserted  now  by  those  aproned 
men,  Granada  had  been  before  me.  I  saw  the  Plaza 
de  Toros,  heard  the  shouts.  Then,  suddenly  the  Al- 


178  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

hambra  faded,  the  bullring  crumbled,  the  shouts  were 
stilled. 

"She  is  not  there!" 

Bradish,  a  cap  on,  took  it  off,  dropped  it,  removed 
his  gloves. 

"Just  as  I  told  you." 

Astonishment  is  dumb.  I  said  nothing.  I  could  not 
say  anything.  Then  it  occurred  to  me  that  I  had  not 
heard  him  aright. 

"What's  all  that?" 

"The  coffin  is  open  and  empty.  Empty!  And  there 
is  nothing  emptier  than  an  empty  coffin." 

He  had  sat  down  on  that  chair  from  Delatour  and 
was  folding  and  refolding  his  gloves  which  presently 
he  put  on  the  table. 

"It  is  just  as  I  told  you." 

The  repetition  of  any  remark  weakens  it.  Besides  he 
had  told  me  nothing  of  the  kind.  In  addition,  and 
although  I  hate  the  word,  I  knew  it  was  impossible.  A 
corpse  cannot  rise  from  a  coffin.  I  doubt  if  even  a  live 
Hercules  could  open  one  from  within.  Then  I  had  it. 

"Look  here!  You  promised  those  rats  a  fortune. 
No  doubt  you  gave  them  something  on  account." 

He  leaned  over,  took  a  cigarette.  "What  I  paid  has 
nothing  to  do  with  it." 

"Everything.  To  guard  against  any  Stop  thief  on 
your  part,  they  arranged  matters  before  the  tea-party 
was  given,  then  when  it  fizzled,  as  they  knew  it  would 
fizzle,  they  cried  Cheat  at  you.  You  protested.  At 
that  they  told  you  to  go  and  look.  Well,  you  have 
looked.  You  found  nothing  because  what  there  was 
had  been  removed." 

He  twirled  the  cigarette.     "The  grass  before  the 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  179 

vault  was  a  foot  high.  If  within  the  last  few  days 
they  had  been  there,  if  anyone  had  been  there,  the 
grass  could  not  have  looked  as  it  did." 

I  turned  it  around  at  him.  "Did  you  ever  hear  of 
Heraclitus?  Heraclitus  died  of  laughing,  literally  of 
laughing,  at  the  stupidity  of  his  friends." 

Bradish  lit  the  cigarette.  "I  am  not  one  of  them 
then.  Perhaps  you  are.  I  know  what  you  are  going 
to  say,  that  they  got  fresh  sods  of  grass  and  planted 
them  for  me.  They  did  nothing  of  the  kind.  I  looked 
into  that  also." 

Drinking  the  smoke,  he  resumed:  "Nelly  never  was 
there  at  all.  I  felt  that  from  the  start  and  what  I 
felt  the  magus  confirmed.  Now  where  is  she?" 

"Ask  that  rat.  If  he  can  raise  the  dead,  raising 
grass  must  be  easy  for  him.  If  it  were  I,  I  would 
prosecute  him,  not  for  bilking  me,  I  would  not  want 
it  known  what  a  bloody  fool  I  had  been,  but  for  rifling 
a  sepulchre." 

He  flicked  his  ashes.  "You  need  not  talk  the  way 
you  write.  Rifling  a  sepulchre !  The  dust  on  the  cof 
fin  was  an  inch  thick.  Perhaps  you  will  say  they  planted 
that  also." 

"It  would  be  only  artistic  of  them  and  on  a  par 
with  everything  else.  The  confidence  game  with  which 
they  gulled  you,  I  cannot  but  admire.  You  are  swallow 
ing  it  still  and  crying  for  more." 

My  shots,  such  as  they  were,  may  have  told.  He 
seemed  to  be  weakening  and  I  gave  him  another. 

"See  here !  Send  for  that  rat,  offer  him  a  release  in 
full  and  another  cheque  if  he  will  tell  you  what  he  did 
with  the  remains." 

"If  he  were  the  crook  you  think  him,  he  would  accept 


1 8o  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

the  offer  and  say  he  dumped  them  in  the  river.  I  admit 
he  is  a  queer  fish.  But  he  is  not  a  crook.  He  does  not 
need  to  be  one.  The  man  is  a  conjurer  and  he  knows  his 
trade.  The  other  night,  after  you  had  gone,  I  had  him 
in  here  again.  He  sat  at  this  end  of  the  table.  At  the 
farther  end  was  that  inkstand.  It  must  weigh  five 
pounds.  He  beckoned,  said  something,  I  don't  know 
what,  and  the  inkstand  slid  of  itself  the  length  of  the 
table  to  him." 

"So  you  think.  It  did  not  slide  of  itself.  It  was 
moved  by  elementals.  That  night  I  could  have  sworn 
they  were  crawling  all  over  him.  I  have  thought  since 
then  that  some  of  them  must  have  crawled  on  you. 
You  looked  it.  I  don't  mean  to  compliment  you,  but 
you  looked  like  a  fiend." 

At  that,  or  at  something  else,  a  memory  perhaps, 
he  shifted,  uneasily  I  thought,  turned  away  and  then 
to  me. 

"We  are  wandering  all  over  the  grounds." 
"Yes,  we  would  be  much  better  off  in  Spain." 
"Leave  me  in  the  lurch  then.     I  am  going  to  find 
Nelly." 

The  faith  that  moved  mountains  I  Instead  of  my 
incredulity  weakening  him,  his  confidence  was  weaken 
ing  me.  That  confidence,  irrational,  illogical,  utterly 
insane,  had  been  superb.  When  he  heard  the  girl  was 
dead  he  did  not  believe  it.  That  disbelief  the  sight 
of  some  damsel  in  the  Park  had  confirmed.  When 
the  young  person  reiterated  what  others  had  asserted, 
he  had  tried  sorcery  to  get  the  girl  back.  That  failing 
he  had  looked  for  her  in  her  coffin.  In  its  emptiness 
his  confidence  was  renewed.  Now  he  was  going  to 
find  her !  Among  the  living  he  was  going  to  hunt  for 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  181 

the  dead!  What  could  you  do,  what  could  anyone 
do  with  a  chap  like  that?  I  saw  but  one  course  and 
I  took  it. 

"Jim,  you  are  sublime !" 

He  must  have  thought  I  was  guying  him.  He  shook 
his  head. 

"I  can  see  it  all  from  your  angle.  I  do  not  blame 
you  because  you  cannot  see  it  from  mine.  It  would  be 
phenomenal  if  you  could.  It  is  not  a  thing  I  can  ana 
lyse.  It  is  not  an  idea,  it  is  a  sensation,  like  joy  or 
like  dread,  which  one  experiences  and  cannot  describe, 
no,  nor  share." 

I  dressed  it  a  bit  and  gave  it  back. 

"It  is  the  inner  voice,  the  voice  that  makes  the 
hero,  makes  the  martyr." 

"And  the  fool,"  he  put  in.  "I  may  be  one.  You 
think  so  and  Cally  would.  If  Cally  knew  what  you 
know  he  would  want  to  lock  me  up.  But  a  fool  may 
be  wise  in  his  folly  and  time  alone  can  show  whether 
I  am  an  imbecile  in  mine." 

He  was  taking  it  then  so  sagely  that  a  recompense 
was  due  and  lightly  I  produced  it. 

"Spain  can  go  hang.     I'll  see  you  through." 

I  made  the  promise  as  one  promises  the  moon.  His 
quick  and  rapid  fire  in  defence  of  the  Eblian  rat  had 
confused,  it  had  not  converted  me.  The  girl  was 
dead.  That  her  tomb  had  opened  and  her  remains  had 
flown  were  matters  temporarily  inexplicable  but  eter 
nally  subordinate.  The  girl  was  dead.  Yet  that  fact, 
which  was  the  cardinal  fact,  Bradish  could  not  and 
would  not  accept.  Readily  I  might  promise  to  see 
him  through.  But  see  him  through  to  what?" 

"And  there  I  am,"  he  was  saying,  "I  am  up  a  tree." 


1 82  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

That  tree,  how  well  I  knew  it !  I  was  as  high  up  in 
it  as  he  and  my  perch  was  more  rickety.  He  had  faith 
to  sustain  him  and  I  had  none.  What  I  did  have  was  a 
range  of  vision  superior  to  his,  because  impersonal,  and 
along  it  I  looked.  The  horizon  was  dark.  Not  a  sign 
of  help.  Not  the  hope  of  a  ladder. 

"Dinner  is  served,  sir." 

In  the  old  days  of  the  grand  manner,  before  the 
battle  began  the  young  officer  put  on  his  gloves.  He 
put  on  the  white  gloves  that  tradition  required.  In  the 
great  crises  of  life  one  should  always  dress  for  dinner. 
Evening  clothes  have  a  steadying  effect.  At  the  an 
nouncement,  I  regretted  I  was  in  flannels. 

At  table  I  forgot  them.  Very  thoughtfully,  Peters 
had  provided  a  cru  from  the  Garonne,  which  while 
not  summery,  had  an  amplitude  that  was  majestic.  In 
its  red  kisses  were  art,  literature,  the  hum  of  lutes,  and 
all  of  them  enchanting  the  palate,  caressing  it  with 
combined  enthrallments.  The  sorceries  of  the  red 
magic  brightened  the  horizon.  Afar  was  a  gleam  that 
looked  like  a  sail  or,  more  serviceably,  a  ladder. 

Yet,  not  being  Archimedes,  I  omitted  to  cry  Eureka ! 

Instead  I  said  and  casually  enough:  "How  did  you 
get  in?" 

The  red  necromancies  may  have  lowered  Bradish 
from  that  tree.  They  may  have  lifted  him  higher.  In 
any  event  he  was  not  at  the  moment  where  he  had  been. 
Vaguely  he  looked  at  me. 

Ordinarily  the  fact  that  Peters  and  Gedney  were 
present  would  have  prevented  any  intimate  conversa 
tion.  But  as  they  knew  about  the  visit  to  the  tomb, 
I  reconstructed  it. 

"The  vault  was  locked,  was  it  not?" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  183 

"Oh!  Yes!  Well,  I  sent  Fletcher  for  a  man  to 
open  it.  It  took  some  time." 

"Afterward,  you  locked  it  again?" 

"Naturally." 

"What  did  you  do  with  the  key?" 

He  turned.    "What  did  I  do  with  the  key,  Gedney  ?" 

"You  left  it  in  the  padlock,  sir." 

"Who  is  at  the  manor?"  I  asked. 

"Nobody.  It  is  boarded  up.  Mrs.  Chilton  wanted 
to  rent  it.  I  had  my  lawyers  take  a  lease  of  it  from 
her.  Why  do  you  ask?" 

"I  shall  be  going  there  tomorrow." 

He  sat  back.  "That's  mighty  nice  of  you.  You  may 
find  something  that  I  missed.  Take  Fletcher  and 
the  car." 

I  stood  up.  "There  are  one  or  two  things  I  have  to 
do  beforehand.  Send  the  car  to  my  shop  at  noon  and 
if  I  find  anything " 

"Fetch  it  straight  here." 

He  turned  again.     "Gedney,  a  cab  for  Mr.  Poole." 

XXV 

THE  cab  took  me  to  a  noble  mansion,  an  exalting 
lift  to  a  door. 

In  the  sorceries  of  the  red  wine  from  the  blue  river, 
it  was  Aly  Bolton  I  had  seen  with  the  ladder.  Aly 
assisting  and  we  might  all  climb  down,  though  what 
lay  at  the  foot  of  the  tree  was  enigmatic  as  the  mys 
teries  of  Eleusis.  Theories  I  had  had.  One  after 
another  they  had  come.  One  after  another  they  had 
gone.  If  Aly  balked  and  refused  then,  until  we  were 
all  dead,  it  might  be  that  only  the  tree  would  remain. 


1 84  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

In  looking  back  at  it  now,  I  realise,  what  I  should 
have  realised  then,  that  there  are  mysteries  it  is  wiser 
to  ignore  than  to  elucidate.  In  the  greenroom  of  the 
future  where  the  hours  fall  in  line,  there  are  many  that 
wound,  there  are  some  that  console.  Time,  that  stages 
the  hours  which  inform  our  lives,  had  sent  Bradish 
many  charged  with  darts  and  might  have  sent  him 
others  that  would  have  dulled  their  pain.  The  grave 
of  all  things  has  its  violet.  Yet,  for  that  lessened 
mourning  to  replace  the  blacker  trappings  of  one's  woe, 
a  grave  there  must  be.  To  the  ineluctable,  the  strong 
est  yield.  It  is  suspense  that  daunts  us  all. 

In  looking  back  now  I  see  that  clearly  enough,  yet 
more  clearly  still  I  see  that  instead  of  helping,  I 
harmed.  The  fact  that  my  intentions  were  good  only 
aggravates  the  offence.  The  best  intentioned  people 
are  the  most  insupportable.  "Pas  de  zele,"  said  Talley 
rand.  Why  did  I  need  to  show  any? 

But  though  now  with  riper  years,  I  ask  myself  these 
things,  I  know  that  whatever  happens,  happens  because 
it  had  to  happen  and  because  it  could  not  happen  other 
wise.  There  is  consolation  in  that,  there  always  is  in 
philosophy  and  one  can  find  consolation  nowhere  else 
except,  as  a  poet  said,  in  the  dictionary. 

"Yes,  sir." 

Moonfaced,  a  little  maid  was  looking  at  me.  How 
long  she  had  been  looking  it  is  awkward  to  conjecture. 
After  reaching  the  door,  the  possibilities  of  the  ladder 
had  swarmed  about  me.  In  considering  them  I  had 
forgotten  I  had  knocked.  I  had  not  seen  the  door 
open  or  the  moonfaced  maid.  I  was  in  the  condition 
of  a  chess  player  who  answers  a  question  minutes  after 
it  has  been  put. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  185 

But  even  as  the  absent  player  awakes  so  did  I  awake 
and  in  awakening  I  smiled. 

Was  Miss  Bolton  visible? 

Then  presently  I  was  tickling  a  gentleman  who  re 
sented  it  so  little  that  he  scaled  me,  perched  on  my 
shoulder  and  was  purring  ostentatiously  when  gra 
ciously,  as  she  did  everything,  the  lady  of  the  ladder 
appeared. 

Then  I  also  purred.  "I  love  your  cat.  I  love  your 
flat.  I  love — lalage.  Duke  ridentem,  duke  loquen- 
tem,  Lalagen  amabo.  Horace  said  that,  or  something 
like  it.  Lalage  was  a  young  woman  who  charmed  his 
leisures.  I  am  sure  you  are  much  better  looking.  But 
sweetly  you  smile,  as  she  smiled.  Sweetly  you  talk,  as 
she  talked.  If  sweetly  you  do  not  blush,  as  sweetly  she 
must  have  blushed,  it  is  because  I  headed  myself  off  in 
time.  Yes,  thank  you,  I  will  sit  down  and  thank  you, 
yes,  I  will  smoke." 

"You  are  thinking  of  something  else  than  that  im 
proper  young  woman." 

Before  I  answered  I  took  and  lighted  a  cigarette. 
Even  then  I  could  not  go  at  it  like  that,  all  of  a  sudden. 
The  art  of  life,  as  of  literature,  consists  in  easy  transi 
tions  and  I  fell  back  on  Bil  Sayers. 

"Yes,  The  Dawn.  Recently  I  was  looking  it  over 
again.  A  very  admirable  performance." 

I  coughed  and  resumed:  "Bil  Sayers  writes  his  books 
as  the  Moslems  built  their  mosques,  mixing  musk  with 
mortar  that  the  whole  structure  should  be  perfumed." 

I  did  not  improvise  that,  or  rather  it  was  my  usual 
improvisation,  one  that  I  had  played  many  a  time  and 
oft  to  the  tune  of  other  works,  other  poems.  But, 
though  she  had  not  blushed  before,  she  flushed  a  little 


1 86  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

then  and  I  knew  my  hackneyed  performance  had  the 
merit  of  pleasing  her,  as  the  picturesque  always  does 
please  the  artist. 

She  shook  a  tapering  finger  at  me.  "That  is  not 
what  you  have  in  mind." 

How  lovely  she  looked!  Adorably  constructed  and 
constructed  too  to  be  adored,  as  she  sat  there,  her  fair 
face  slightly  flushed,  one  bare  arm  on  the  table,  the 
other  supporting  her  head,  I  wished  I  were  Greuze. 

"What  is  it?"  she  asked. 

"Well,  you  see,  you  know,  after  I  left  here  the 
other  evening,  a  problem  occurred  to  me.  Why  is  it 
when  a  man  is  in  love  he  talks  like  a  fool?" 

"That  is  not  it  either,"  she  said,  and  I  thought  the 
flush  deepened. 

That  annoyed  me.  She  knew  perfectly  well  that  I 
wanted  her.  There  was  no  news  in  that.  But  it  was 
vexatious  of  her  to  accept  my  own  estimate  of  myself. 
It  was  an  estimate  which  she  should  have  returned  to 
me  corrected  and  revised.  But  that  was  not  Aly's  way 
and  in  my  annoyance  I  let  go. 

"Why  do  you  ask  what  I  am  thinking  when  you 
know  without  being  told?  I  am  thinking  of  you  and 
a  ladder.  I  am  up  a  tree  and  I  want  to  climb  down." 

"Is  the  tree  on  the  Hudson?" 

Then,  as  I  nodded,  she  added:  "You  brought  it  in 
with  you.  But  whether  it  is  an  oak  or  an  aspen,  the 
tree  of  knowledge  or  the  tree  of  the  golden  fruit,  you 
must  tell  before  I  can  say  whether  anything  I  may  do 
will  be  of  use." 

I  put  the  whole  thing  before  her;  the  danse  macabre, 
the  rat's  assertion  that  the  girl  was  alive,  the  visit  to 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  187 

the  vault,  the  empty  coffin,  the  profundities  of  Bradish's 
prodigious  faith. 

"And  I  thought  him  mad,"  I  concluded.  "He  may  be 
saner  than  I.  But  you  can  see  now  the  tree  on  which 
we  sit.  Barring  a  miracle,  he  alone  or  I  alone  or  both 
together  cannot,  whatever  we  contrive,  get  behind  the 
puzzle  of  what  became  of  the  corpse.  It  is  true,  he 
will  have  it  that  there  was  no  corpse  and  there  is  his 
amazing  faith.  Of  course,  without  a  crystal  or  even 
with  one,  I  cannot  make  him  see  and  hear  what  I  did. 
I  cannot  make  him  hear  the  physician,  as  I  heard  him, 
pronounce  the  girl  dead.  I  cannot  make  him  see  her, 
as  I  saw  her,  in  her  coffin.  It  is  not  that  he  doubts 
my  word,  he  prefers  the  testimony  of  his  own  intui 
tions  and  what  is  one  to  do  with  a  chap  like  that? 
Between  us,  one  or  the  other  is  wrong.  He  thinks 
I  am,  I  know  he  is.  For  assuming  what  has  happened 
time  and  again,  that  the  girl  was  in  a  trance  and  was 
buried  alive,  assuming  all  that,  then,  if  after  being 
put  in  the  vault,  consciousness  returned,  she  would 
have  died  of  suffocation  in  the  coffin.  She  could  not 
have  got  from  it.  But  assuming  even  that  she  did,  she 
could  not  have  got  out  of  the  vault.  No  one  would 
have  heard  her  calls  for  help.  Moreover  if  anyone 
did  hear,  it  is  quite  on  the  cards  that  they  would  have 
shrieked  and  run  away.  The  problem  therefore  is  just 
this :  I  want  to  know  what  became  of  the  body,  Bradish 
wants  to  know  what  became  of  the  girl." 

Aly  looked  up.  "To  solve  the  problem,  you  spoke 
of  a  miracle.  What  did  you  mean?" 

I  shook  my  head.  "You  don't  need  to  ask,  you 
know.  The  miracle  is  you,  Aly  Bolton.  You  are  a 


1 88  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

living,  breathing  miracle,  a  miracle  of  beauty  in  a 
miracle  of  flesh." 

"Also,  there  is  a  Mr.  Chandos  Poole,  who  is  a 
highly  lyrical  young  man." 

uYes,"  I  told  her,  "and  a  trifle  vatic  to  boot.  For 
he  can  tell  you  one  thing  which  you  cannot  foresee.  He 
intends  to  be  far  more  lyric  than  he  is.  He  intends  to 
be  so  lyric  that  seraphs  will  take  up  the  burden  of  his 
lay  and  strum  it  at  you  from  their  golden  harps." 

That  was  an  improvisation  and  poor  as  every  im 
provisation  is  that  has  not  been  practised  and  rehearsed 
in  advance.  Conscious  of  which,  I  coughed  again  and 
took  another  cigarette. 

With  an  indifference  so  vividly  incandescent  that  I 
could  have  caught  and  kissed  her  until  she  swooned 
and  died,  she  stood  up,  left  the  room,  followed  by  her 
ostentatious  cat.  Then  almost  at  once  she  returned 
with  a  wicker-covered  gourd  of  glass  which  she  said, 
and  which  I  did  not  believe,  she  had  given  herself,  and 
which  contains  the  liquid  sol  bemol  that  mortals — mor 
tals  who  know — call  mandarin  liqueur. 

She  gave  me  a  thimble.  I  lapped  it,  poured  a  drop 
on  my  forefinger  and  offered  it  to  Signer  Matouchi. 
He  sniffed  and  bit  me.  Any  kindness  is  repaid  in  pain. 

Aly,  who  had  had  half  a  thimble,  put  down  her  little 
glass. 

"Who  was  at  the  manor  the  night  of  the  funeral?" 

Nursing  the  bite,  I  told  her.  "Bradish,  who  was 
unconscious,  a  nurse  who  was  dumb,  a  servant  who 
was  deaf  and  a  mechanician  who  was  dead." 

For  a  moment  she  considered  the  picture.  Then 
she  tried  to  frame  it. 

"It  would  fit  in  your  ghost  story." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  189 

I  shook  my  head. 

She  smiled  and  smoothed  her  hair.  "You  do  not 
think  so  now.  You  will  later.  At  present  you  are  too 
near  it.  It  lacks  perspective  for  you.  But  let  me  ask. 
Why  not  make  a  scenario  of  it?" 

"For  whom?" 

"Well,"  she  said,  still  smiling,  still  smoothing  her 
hair.  "There  is  Bil  Sayers.  You  seem  to  like  his 
work." 

The  manner  in  which  it  afterward  came  about  has 
nothing  to  do  with  the  present  document,  but  later  a 
novel  of  Bil  Sayers  appeared  which  I  have  already 
cited.  Entitled  The  Halls  of  Eblis,  it  presents  many  of 
the  incidents  that  are  given  here.  Otherwise  it  is  supe 
riorly  dramatic,  the  denouement  being  totally  different 
from  what  actually  occurred.  That  is  as  it  should  be. 
The  climaxes  of  fiction  are  logical,  those  of  life  are  not. 
In  fiction  matters  turn  out  as  they  ought  to.  In  life 
it  is  just  the  reverse. 

I  throw  that  in  now  to  get  rid  of  it.  At  the  time 
I  was  not  thinking  of  fiction  but  of  a  corpse  that  had 
assumed  a  fictional  aspect  of  life.  I  wanted  to  be  rid 
of  that  also.  I  wanted  it  safely  reburied.  Meanwhile, 
nursing  the  ungrateful  bite,  I  looked  over  at  Aly.  She 
seemed  to  be  nursing  the  scenario  which  she  had  sug 
gested. 

I  brought  her  back.  "I  have  shown  you  the  tree. 
Will  you  supply  the  ladder?" 

She  looked  up.  "A  descent  is  always  possible,  but 
is  it  wise?" 

"Why  do  you  say  that?    Do  you  see  anything?" 

"No,  I  am  in  the  tree  with  you.  But  you  want  to 
climb  down  and  I  do  not" 


190  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Surprisedly  I  stared.    "Why  don't  you  want  to?" 

"I  might  disturb  things." 

"Things!"  I  amazedly  repeated.     "What  things?" 

"The  things  at  the  bottom.  They  are  so  quiet.  It 
is  wrong  to  disturb  them.  It  is  always  wrong  to  stir 
the  silent  things  that  do  not  speak.  The  world  is  full 
of  noise  and  sin.  The  silent  things  only  wish  for 
silence.  It  is  wicked  to  go  down  and  harm  them  where 
they  hide." 

"But,"  I  protested,  "you  move  me  to  tears." 

I  said  it  jestingly,  but  at  once  I  could  have  said  it  in 
earnest.  Her  eyes  had  filled.  I  saw  her  tears.  None 
the  less  she  smiled.  It  was  very  curious.  She  was 
both  smiling  and  crying,  crying  because  she  could  not 
help  it  and  smiling  that  I  might  not  be  distressed.  It 
was  not  only  curious,  it  was  affecting.  I  leaned  toward 
her. 

"What  was  it  that  you  saw — down  there?" 

She  brushed  her  eyes.  "Nothing.  I  have  not 
looked.  It  is  what  I  fear  to  see." 

"And  what  is  that?" 

"I  do  not  know.    I  only  know  I  dread  it." 

"But  you  want  to  help.    You  said  so." 

"Yes,  I  said  that." 

"Then  will  you?" 

"I  will  help,  but  I  will  not  harm." 

"Aly  Bolton,  listen  to  me.  You  will  harm  if  you  do 
not  help." 

"How  will  I  harm?" 

"Banality  kills.  Suspense  is  more  treacherous.  It 
may  drive  Bradish  insane." 

At  that  she  made  a  little  pathetic  motion  and  I 
added :  "Will  you  go  there  with  me  tomorrow  ?" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  191 

She  pressed  her  hands  together  almost  as  though  she 
were  wringing  them.  I  loosened  and  kissed  them  and 
looked  up  at  her. 

"Will  you?' 'I  repeated. 

"Yes,"  she  said  longly.     "I  will  go." 

Her  eyes  were  still  wet  and  why  were  they?  Though 
I  asked  she  did  not  tell,  perhaps  she  could  not.  But 
they  were  still  wet  when,  our  simple  plans  simply  made, 
she  saw  me  to  the  door. 


XXVI 

I  AWOKE  to  the  crash  of  worlds,  to  the  trumpets  of 
the  last  judgment.  In  the  sarabands  of  lightning  there 
was  an  expansiveness,  a  continuity  and  a  glory  that 
made  the  black  sky  gold.  A  picture  torn  from  the 
mythologies,  the  war  of  titans  and  of  gods,  I  went  to 
the  roof  to  enjoy  it.  The  lightning  there  was  rasp 
berry,  the  sky  when  not  a  gold  field  was  a  tent  of 
crepe.  Between  was  scudding  lingerie,  and  I  held  my 
hair  on  as  I  stood,  like  a  valkyr  I  hope,  in  the  howling 
and  deluvian  rain. 

The  night  before,  the  vibrance  of  Aly's  sensitive 
ness  had  affected  me.  I  dreamed  of  undergrass  grown 
overgreen  where,  in  bogs  of  leprous  scum,  devils  danced 
and  ghouls  were  coldly  crouching.  Ordinarily  I  would 
have  taken  them  straight  to  the  workshop.  The 
crashing  worlds  interfered.  When,  over  the  Palisades, 
a  curtain  had  risen,  when  the  lightning  had  rescaled 
the  sky,  when  gods  and  titans  had  slunk  back  to  the 
classical  dictionaries,  and  the  air  aquiver  with  their 
surge  and  rout  was  wholly  divine,  I  could  only  rush 


192  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

down,  dry  my  hair  and  change  my  clothes.  It  was 
high  noon  and  Aly  waited. 

The  flight  through  the  suburbs,  the  shoot  up  the 
Hudson,  pictures  that  I  did  not  see,  incidents  that  did 
not  occur,  the  antiquarian  will  set  forth  in  Bil  Savers' 
novel.  He  is  the  poet  of  this  matter  of  which  I  am 
but  the  clerk.  For  the  dull-as-ditchwater  effect  of  the 
present  account  I  offer  therefore  no  apologies.  On 
the  contrary.  The  effect  has  its  value.  Every  scrupu 
lous  critic  knows  that  no  history  can  be  reliable  unless 
it  is  packed  with  yawns. 

Among  the  simple  plans  of  the  night  before,  lunch 
eon  at  the  village  inn  had  been  included.  Since  then, 
Aly  had  otherwise  ordered.  When  the  exquisite  girl 
got  with  me  in  the  car,  there  got  with  us  a  basket  in 
which  were  sandwiches  and  a  thermos  bottle  of  coffee 
and  water,  and  a  very  good  drink  I  have  always  found 
it, — though,  to  take  the  taste  from  my  mouth  of  one 
or  two  of  the  surprises  that  awaited  us,  I  would  have 
said  Thank  you  to  a  glass  of  brandy. 

Meanwhile,  as  Aly  entered  the  car,  I  looked  in  her 
eyes.  The  rain  had  dried  them.  They  were  blue  as 
the  sky  and  bluer.  On  her  face  the  slight  flush  of 
the  night  before  persisted,  maintained  there  perhaps 
by  the  consciousness  of  the  ladder.  But,  as  the  car 
flew  on,  these  delicacies  lost  themselves  behind  a  motor 
veil  and  it  was  not  until  we  reached  the  manor  that 
I  could  feast  again  upon  them. 

The  house,  which  had  had  an  ugly,  comfortable  air, 
exhaled  then  the  more  penetrating  atmosphere  of 
emptiness  and  desertion.  The  front  door  was  walled, 
the  candid  windows  were  barred  and  the  grounds 
which  on  the  funeral  day  had  seemed  none  too  smart, 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  193 

were  the  unkempt.  Desolation  brooded  there.  Only 
the  vault  was  unaltered.  In  the  days  of  the  landed 
gentry,  the  Chiltons  had  been  a  high-handed,  high- 
headed  lot.  What  remained  of  them  that  vault  con 
tained. 

We  had  left  Fletcher,  the  car,  the  basket  and  the 
veil  on  the  road  beyond  and,  as  we  approached  the 
vault,  I  heard  her  say,  perhaps  to  me,  perhaps  to  her 
self: 

"There  it  is,  exactly  as  I  saw  it." 

There,  too,  was  the  long  grass  of  which  Bradish 
had  told,  a  bit  trampled  since  his  own  excursion,  ,and 
in  the  padlock  was  the  key  concerning  which  Gedney 
had  informed  him.  Whether  the  downpour  of  the 
morning  had  already  rusted  it  is  now  immaterial  but 
it  would  not  turn.  As,  at  the  time,  I  could  crack  a 
hickory  nut  with  my  fingers,  I  knew  that  where  I  failed 
Fletcher  would  do  no  better  and  I  was  for  sending 
him  for  the  man  of  the  day  before,  when  Aly  tried  it. 
The  key  turned,  the  hasp  loosened,  the  padlock  fell  and 
through  the  then  opened  door  the  chill  breath  of  the 
dead  came  at  us. 

From  before  it  Aly  retreated.  The  flush  then  had 
gone,  but  though  at  the  moment  she  was  pale  she  must 
have  been  resolute  for  she  rallied  and  entered.  The 
back  of  the  vault  was  dark,  the  north  side  was  dim 
but  on  the  south  side,  on  the  lower  slab,  where  I  had 
seen  the  coffin  put,  light  entered  with  her  and  I  saw 
again  that  bier.  But  not  as  I  had  seen  it  when  I  fol 
lowed  it  there.  It  was  open,  it  was  empty,  and  back 
to  me  swam  the  remark  that  Bradish  had  made: 

"There  is  nothing  emptier  than  an  empty  coffin." 

Aly,  who  needed  no  guidance,  no  prompting,  no 


194  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

word  from  me,  removed  a  glove,  put  her  bare  hand  on 
the  coffin  and  looked  away,  looked  up.  At  what? 
What  did  she  see?  Her  lips  moved,  but  they  may 
have  gone  dry.  She  moistened  them  and  so  absent  was 
her  expression  that  I  am  sure  she  did  it  unconsciously. 
Her  upper  teeth  were  pressed  on  her  lower  lip.  I 
could  see  the  edges,  see  too  the  facial  muscles  con 
tracting  the  corners  of  her  mouth.  Still  she  looked 
up,  but  through  eyelids  that  had  closed.  Hers  was 
the  rapt  look  I  had  read  of  and  never  seen.  Then 
presently,  with  an  intake  of  the  breath,  her  eyes  opened, 
she  turned,  left  the  vault,  but  stood  by  me  while  I 
recovered  the  padlock  and  fastened  it  again. 

Finishing  with  it,  I  turned  to  her.  She  was  putting 
on  her  glove  and  she  finished  with  that  before  she 
spoke,  preluding  what  she  did  say  with  a  little  motion, 
a  gesture  slight,  perhaps  involuntary,  as  though  either 
expressing  regret  for  what  she  was  about  to  tell,  or 
else  disclaiming  responsibility  for  it,  a  little  gesture 
that  I  could  interpret  as  I  pleased. 

"There  is  a  man,  tall,  slim,  handsome,  with  the 
brave  air  of  a  young  prince  marching  past  lifted  swords 
out  from  a  tapestry  of  the  renaissance.  Who  is  he?" 

"Go  on." 

"He  went  to  the  coffin,  swept  heaped  flowers  from 
it,  raised  the  top.  He  lifted  it  so  readily  it  could  not 
have  been  closed.  She  lay  there  white,  motionless, 
dead.  He  bent  over  her,  bent  closer,  kissed  her, 
straightened,  moved  aside,  moved  back,  bent  to  her 
again,  put  his  arms  about  her,  lifted  her  from  the 
coffin,  carried  her  out,  carried  her  into  the  night.  I 
saw  no  more.  Who  is  he?" 

"Austen." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  195 

"The  man  who  was  in  love  with  her?" 

"And  with  whom  she  was  in  love." 

But  I  did  not  ask  were  she  sure.  I  did  not  ask 
whether  there  were  the  chance  of  error.  On  the  morn 
ing  when  she  awoke  in  my  workshop,  I  brought  her 
coffee,  and  a  cup.  From  that  cup  she  had  evolved  a  pic 
ture  of  me  as  a  child,  of  my  grandfather  who  was  living 
then,  of  the  room  in  which  he  sat.  No,  I  did  not  ask 
were  she  sure.  Nor  did  I  marvel  at  the  psychometry 
with  which  I  was  familiar.  It  was  the  ladder.  It  was 
for  that  I  had  brought  her  there.  I  merely  exploded. 

"So  that  is  it  then !  But  why  did  he  carry  her  away? 
Where  did  he  carry  her?  What  did  he  do  with  her 
when  he  got  her  there?  He  could  only  have  buried 
her  again  and  not  that  it  can  make  the  slightest  differ 
ence  to  her  now,  but  when  she  lived,  had  she  thought 
of  herself  as  a  corpse,  an  idea  I  am  sure  that  never 
entered  her  head,  but  if  it  had  she  would  have  said: 
Put  me  with  my  people.  Why  then  did  he  carry  her 
away?  Why  did  he  profane  her  with  kisses?  What 
Bradish  did  was  sacrilege.  What  Austen  did  seems 
to  me  worse.  Why  did  he  do  it?" 

"The  magus  said  she  was  alive." 

"But  I  saw  her  dead.  You  saw  her  dead.  I  re 
member  your  very  words  'There  she  lay,  white,  mo 
tionless,  dead.'  " 

She  made  another  little  gesture,  just  a  motion  with 
her  hand. 

"But  because  I  can  sometimes  see  things,  it  does  not 
follow  that  I  can  explain  them." 

"No,  of  course  not.  Besides,  in  asking  a  string  of 
imbecile  questions,  I  was  putting  them  to  myself.  I 


196  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

was  trying  to  clarify  my  own  ideas  and  I  cannot,  I'll 
be  shot  if  I  can." 

She  got  away  from  it.  "Don't  you  think  we  might 
give  that  poor  man  a  sandwich  or  two?  He  drove  so 
well." 

In  exploding  the  questions,  I  had  been  too  full  of 
them  to  notice,  but  I  saw  then  that  she  looked  com 
pletely  fagged,  as  one  must  I  suppose  after  such  an 
expenditure  of  nervous  force. 

"We  might  have  a  few  ourselves.  I  know  I  would 
say  Thank  you  for  a  glass  of  brandy.  But  I  would 
say  it  for  you,  you  look  utterly  done." 

None  the  less  and  however  exhausted,  she  saw  to 
it  that  Fletcher  had  his  sandwiches  and,  with  them,  a 
glass  of  coffee  and  water. 

Then,  for  a  while,  the  basket  between  us,  we  sat  on 
the  steps  of  the  house  where  she  tormented  a  bit  of 
bread.  She  was  not  hungry  she  said,  except  for  cigar 
ettes  and  as  she  sat  and  smoked  I  saw  about  her  that 
air  of  languor  I  had  noticed  the  first  time  I  was  at 
her  flat  and  where  she  may  have  been  psychometrising 
also. 

In  watching  her,  I  stuffed  and,  at  the  same  time, 
reviewed  the  picture  series  revealed  by  her  latest  tour 
de  force.  Charged  with  surmises,  with  hypotheses, 
with  interrogations,  the  pictures  passed  before  me.  For 
my  own  edification  I  tried  to  imagine  what  had  oc 
curred  before  they  were  taken  and  what  had  hap 
pened  afterward.  Considered  in  the  ensemble  they 
were  illustrations  for  an  unwritten  tale  of  Hoffman, 
etchings  for  some  story  lost  or  strayed  from  the  port 
folio  of  Villiers  de  lisle  Adam,  vignettes  for  an  un 
published  manuscript  of  Poe. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  197 

From  them,  I  turned  to  her. 

"Last  night  I  dreamed  of  dancing  devils  and  crouch 
ing  ghouls.  I  don't  wonder  now.  Austen  cannot  be 
plural  but  he  is  certainly  singular.  Singular!  He  is 
epic.  The  imagination  reels  from  before  him.  For 
what  lethean  farewells,  for  what  plutonian  embraces, 
for  what  lemurianisms  did  he  go  to  the  vault  that 
night?  What  drew  him  there  and  what  having  drawn 
him  there,  induced  him  to  take  her  away?  Barring 
the  old  tales  of  mediaeval  monasteries,  there  is  nothing 
like  it  anywhere.  Austen  is  not  epic  merely,  he  is 
unique.  I  should  like  to  have  a  word  with  him. 
Bradish  certainly  will." 

The  sibyl  sighed.  "Poor  man,  his  path  has  been 
hard  and  is  to  be  harder  yet.  Heretofore  it  has  been 
a  path,  a  very  uncertain  path,  but  still  a  path  on  which 
there  was  light.  Now  it  is  a  blind  alley." 

She  paused,  sighed  again  and  stood  up.  "How 
wrong  it  is  to  stir  the  silent  things  that  do  not  wish  to 
speak." 

Through  the  long  green  afternoon,  back  to  the 
sordid  city,  back  from  sepulchral  visions  to  the  triviali 
ties  of  the  everyday,  on  we  flew.  We  flew  whirlingly, 
noisily  and  yet  silent  as  the  things  that  should  not  stir. 
Aly  could  not  talk.  One  of  the  rare  beings  that  never 
complain  and  always  console,  her  head  must  have  been 
splitting,  but  she  said  nothing  of  it.  Only,  she  could 
not  talk  and,  at  her  house,  I  thought  her  hand  trembled 
when  she  reached  it  to  tell  me  goodbye. 

The  white  staring  house  came  next.  In  the  library 
there,  Bradish  resembled  a  great  caged  beast  of  the 
jungle,  a  wounded  lion,  with  nothing  for  his  mind  to 
chew  on,  nothing  except  the  marvel  of  the  empty  bier. 


198  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Well?"  he  threw  at  me.     "Find  anything?" 

"Everything.  But  before  you  can  grasp  it,  I  must 
tell  you  that  Miss  Bolton " 

"Damn  Miss  Bolton.  What  do  you  mean  by  every 
thing?" 

For  that  damn,  ordinarily  I  would  have  damned 
him,  but  on  the  top  branch  of  the  tree  where  he 
prowled  he  needed  indulgence.  I  let  it  go  therefore 
and  gave  it  to  him. 

"Austen  took  her." 

Open-mouthed  he  fell  back  and  clutched  first  at  a 
chair,  then  at  the  table,  all  the  hate,  all  the  virulence, 
all  the  murderous  jealousy  of  the  male  mounting  and 
flaming  in  that  spider  on  his  face.  Instantly  hideous, 
he  shook.  Yet  then,  one  has  to  recognise,  that  in 
beasts,  in  men,  in  women,  jealousy,  the  most  primitive 
of  emotions,  is  the  most  blinding  of  all.  At  that  mo 
ment,  Bradish,  mentally,  was  trampling  Austen  beneath 
his  heels,  gouging  his  eyes  out  with  them,  trampling 
him  to  death. 

That  sweet  surcease  not  being  practicable,  at  all 
events  not  then,  he  gave  a  sort  of  yelp,  looked  at  me, 
I  dare  say  without  seeing  me,  and  disdaining  the  bell, 
called  mightily. 

"Hey!     Peters!     Gedney!" 

From  the  hall  beyond,  both  hastened,  Gedney  with 
his  catlike  tread,  Peters  with  his  mask  of  wood. 

Pointing  a  finger  like  a  pistol  at  the  latter, 

"Er-er,"  he  stuttered,  "a  Mr.  Austen,  he  called  here, 
left  a  card.  Find  it." 

"Yes,  sir,"  said  the  mask.     "Thank  you,  sir." 

"And  Gedney,"  he  called  at  the  catman.  "Fletcher 
waiting?  Tell  him  to  wait." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  199 

"I  say,  old  chap,"  I  put  in,  threshing  about  for 
what  I  could  say.  "You  rather  left  this  business  to 
me.  Now  don't  you  think " 

"Think!"  he  roared.  "I  have  done  nothing  but 
think.  Now  I  shall  act." 

I  ran  a  spoke  in  at  him.    "He  won't  be  at  home." 

"I'll  damn  soon  find  out." 

"If  you  please,  sir." 

Peters  with  a  card  on  a  tray,  was  presenting  it. 

Bradish  snapped  it  up,  snapped  it  back. 

"Look  him  up  in  the  telephone  book.  Say  I  am 
coming.  Say  James  Bradish  is  coming  at  once. 
Say " 

"Yes,"  I  threw  in.  "Tell  him  to  clear  the  decks  and 
prepare  for  action." 

Fiercely  he  turned  on  me.     "I  wish " 

"So  do  I.  I  wish  you  had  some  sense.  Can't  you 
see  that  to  get  him,  there  will  have  to  be  a  surprise 
attack.  Have  Peters  tell  him  to  call  to  quarters  and 
he  will  be  ready  for  you.  Take  him  off  his  guard, 
you  idiot." 

The  strategy  was  a  douche.  From  before  it  he 
backed.  He  did  not  like  it.  I  could  see  that.  I  could 
see  that  what  he  wanted  was  to  sail  right  in,  flags 
flying,  trumpets  blowing,  batteries  unmasked,  fair  play 
and  be  hanged  to  you.  But  into  his  dislike  for  any 
strategy  the  idea  must  have  filtered  that  Austen  him 
self  was  not  playing  fair,  for  suddenly  he  rounded  and 
turned  to  Peters  who  had  stood  before  us  precisely  as 
though  he  were  waiting  to  hear  whether  he  were  to 
fetch  sherry  and  bitters  or  tea  and  toast 

"Find  out  when  he  will  be  in." 

"Thank  you,  sir." 


200  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Now  that  is  more  like  it,"  I  said  as  the  man  with 
drew,  "and  I'll  go  with  you." 

He  turned  again.  "No  you  won't.  He  would  think 
I  had  brought  a  husky  along.  I'll  show  him.  I'll 
settle  this  business  myself." 

"But  see  here,"  I  said,  sparring  for  wind.  "You 
know  nothing  about  it.  Hadn't  you  better  have  a  few 
facts  to  go  on  first?" 

"You  said  he  took  her.     Did  he  or  did  he  not?" 

"Yes,  but " 

"That's  all  I  need." 

"Except  a  gun." 

The  shot  confused  him.  Ardently  I  wished  that  with 
chloroform  I  could  dull  the  confusion  into  inaction. 

Yet  the  chloroform  I  lacked,  Peters  serviceably,  if 
metaphorically,  produced. 

"The  gentleman  is  not  at  home,  sir." 

"Then  find  out  when  he  will  be." 

"Yes,  sir.  I  asked,  sir.  Mr.  Austen's  man  said  that 
Mr.  Austen  was  expected  at  seven." 

Bradish  sat  down  and  tapped  at  his  teeth.  The 
chloroform  was  acting  and,  in  a  moment,  when  the 
anaesthetist  had  gone,  I  took  his  place. 

"It  seems  unfortunate,  but  you  never  can  tell.  If 
all  of  a  sudden  he  marched  in  here,  what  could  you  do, 
what  could  you  say?  You  could  only  shout,  'Where's 
my  wife?'  and  have  him  shout,  'What  do  you  mean?' 
There  you  would  be.  You  couldn't  tell  him.  You  don't 
know.  Don't  you  have  any  tea  in  the  house?  I  have 
been  at  it  for  you  all  night  and  all  day.  I  am  starving 
and  you  lack  the  decency  to  offer  me  a  crust.  What  a 
curse  it  is  to  have  a  friend  like  you." 

He  muttered  and  moved.    Anaesthesia  was  not  com- 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  201 

plete.  But  confusion  was  departing.  The  assassin 
was  slinking  away.  Presently  the  normal  being  would 
return.  Even  then  he  was  showing  his  head. 

He  touched  a  bell.    "Tea!" 

When  presently  it  came,  he  drank  two  cups,  with  a 
drop  of  brandy  in  them.  I  was  glad  to  see  him  at  it. 
Tea  clarifies,  brandy  strengthens,  and  force,  though 
not  too  much  of  it,  and  sense,  though  not  too  much  of 
that  either,  was  what  he  needed  most. 

He  put  down  the  cup.     "Suppose  you  tell  me." 

At  that,  I  outlined  Aly's  grand  act  on  the  triple 
psychic  trapese,  omitting  only  the  Stygian  kiss  which 
she  had  beheld  there.  The  rest  I  gave  him.  The  feat 
itself,  the  palpitant  gyrations,  may,  or  may  not,  have 
surprised  him.  He  said  nothing  on  the  subject,  nor, 
in  regard  to  the  abduction,  did  he  say — and  I  thought 
it  singularly  heroic  of  him — that  he  had  always  sus 
pected  it.  Quite  the  contrary.  His  first  comment  was 
that  he  had  thought  of  everything  but  that. 

His  second  comment  seemed  to  me  less  commend 
able. 

"Nelly  was  the  lady  of  the  steps.  It  was  she  whom 
Brevoort  saw  and  to  whom  Miss  Bolton  spoke.  She 
has  taken  her  mother's  name." 

"But  see  here "  I  began. 

He  checked  me.  "Do  drop  all  that.  It  is  the  old 
song.  I  am  sick  of  it,  sick  and  tired  of  it  and  the 
variations.  You  were  about  to  tell  me  she  is  dead. 
She  is  not  dead.  She  is  alive.  I  knew  it  from  the 
start." 

"But  see  here,"  I  again  began,  renewing  to  him  the 
objections  to  any  such  possibility  which  I  had  advanced 
to  Aly  at  the  manor. 


202  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

He  treated  them  like  cobwebs.  "That  is  not  the 
point.  The  point  is  where  did  he  hide  her?  Where 
has  he  been  hiding  her  ever  since?" 

"You  will  have  to  ask  him.  But  I  doubt  that  she 
is  hidden.  The  lady  of  the  steps  was  not  hidden, 
Brevoort's  lady  of  the  shop  could  come  and  go  and 
Miss  Fellowes  had  the  freedom  of  the  city.  Then  also 
Miss  Fellowes  had  a  man  in  tow,  an  old  man.  If 
Austen  had  her  hidden  she  would  not  be  about,  nor 
would  she  be  roaming  the  streets  with  any  man,  young 
or  old.  Besides  this  Miss  Fellowes  is  probably  alive, 
whereas " 

Impatiently  Bradish  shoved  at  his  cup.  "There  you 
go  again.  But  no  matter.  I'll  know  tonight." 

"Yes,  but  softly  does  it.  The  stupidest  thing  you 
can  do  is  to  make  a  row." 

"Ah,  there  at  last  you  are  right !  When  I  first  heard 
of  the  abduction,  there  might  have  been  one,  there 
would  have  been  one,  there  could  not  have  been  any 
thing  else.  But  there  will  be  none  now.  All  the  same, 
I'll  make  him  disgorge." 

That  was  reasonable  enough.  Anaesthesia  had  had 
its  proper  effect.  I  could  safely  leave  him  and,  as  I 
had  troubles  of  my  own,  I  got  up  to  go. 

He  motioned  at  me.     "I  don't  know  but  that- " 

It  broke  off.    In  a  moment  he  put  it  together  again. 

"See  here.  I  don't  care  a  tinker's  curse  what  Austen 
thinks.  This  is  a  ticklish  business.  I  may  need  a 
witness." 

I  sat  down  again. 

"All  right.  Here  he  is.  I'll  go  you.  I  wanted  to 
from  the  start." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  203 

He  looked  at  his  watch. 

"I  can't  sit  here  and  twirl  my  thumbs.  Suppose  we 
start  now.  If  he  isn't  in,  we  can  camp  on  his  door 
step." 

I  jumped  up. 

"Comeonski." 


XXVII 

AT  the  house  where,  long  since,  before  anything  at 
all  had  happened,  Austen  had  buttonholed  me,  I  led 
the  way  up  the  stair  to  the  floor  where  he  lived  and 
on  which,  facing  the  head  of  the  stair,  were  two  par 
allel  flats. 

Uncertainly  before  them  I  hesitated.  Was  Austen's 
the  one  on  the  left  or  at  the  right?  In  the  one  which 
was  not  his  I  had,  on  that  remote  visit,  seen  a  scrub 
woman.  She  may  have  eloped.  She  was  no  longer 
there.  Both  doors  were  closed.  Moreover  dusk  had 
come.  The  landing  was  dark.  If  there  were  names  on 
the  doors,  the  names  were  invisible. 

I  turned  to  Bradish.     "I  don't  know  which  is  his." 
He  shoved  me  aside.     "Potluck  then." 
Already  he  was  feeling  for  the  button.     Whether 
he  found  it  or  not  I  do  not  know.    Yet,  instantly,  the 
door  swung  back.     There,  his  hat  on,  a  stick  in  one 
hand,  the  other  still  on  the  knob,  was  the  abductor. 

From  behind,  a  light  in  the  hall  showed  Bradish's 
face  without  showing  Austen's  and  whether  he  were 
surprised  or  not  I  could  not  tell.  I  am  sure  though  he 
must  have  been.  In  any  case,  he  did  not  betray  it. 
He  had  himself  in  hand  at  once  and  devilish  cool  he 
was  about  it. 


204  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Hello !    Was  it  you  that  telephoned?" 

That  was  his  greeting,  offhand  as  you  please.  But 
even  as  he  spoke,  Bradish  was  speaking  to  him. 

"I  want  a  word  with  you." 

Austen  stood  aside.  "How  de  do,  Poole?  Come 
in.  That  room  there,  if  you  don't  mind." 

Bradish  went  on.  As  I  followed  I  saw  a  head  poked 
suddenly  through  a  doorway  farther  down  the  hall. 
It  was  Austen's  gnome  I  thought.  But  now  we  were 
all  in  the  sitting-room  where  I  had  been  before.  Ap 
parently,  nothing  had  happened  to  it.  It  had  the  same 
careless  air.  On  the  sideboard  were  decanters.  On 
the  table  was  the  drooping  green  cover.  As  before, 
the  cupboard  door  stood  open. 

Austen  closed  it.  He  had  entered  with  us  and, 
after  closing  the  cupboard,  indicated  the  decanters. 

"Have  a  drink?" 

Bradish  took  off  his  hat. 

"Austen,  where  is  my  wife?" 

Austen  motioned. 

"Do  sit  down." 

I  did.  Bradish  remained  standing.  He  stood  on 
one  side  of  the  table,  Austen  at  the  other.  On  the 
table  was  an  ivory  paper-cutter.  Austen  reached  for 
it  and  said: 

"I  don't  know  why  you  ask  me  that." 

Bradish  pulled  at  his  gloves.  "You  know  perfectly 
and  I  will  thank  you  to  tell  me." 

Austen  looked  at  the  ivory  knife,  then  at  me.  From 
me  he  looked  at  Bradish. 

"Your  wife  is  dead." 

Bradish  had  removed  a  glove.  He  struck  the  table 
with  it. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  205 

"See  here,  I  have  reason  to  believe  that  after  the 
funeral  you  entered  the  vault  and  abducted  her." 

Austen  threw  down  the  knife  and  turned  again  to 
me.  It  was  as  though  he  were  saying:  "You  hear 
that!  He's  crazy." 

Bradish  may  have  so  interpreted  it.  Resting  one 
hand  on  the  table,  he  leaned  forward. 

"I  propose  to  get  at  the  bottom  of  this.  I  don't 
mean  to  be  more  disagreeable  than  I  can  help, 
but " 

Austen  interrupted.  "You  needn't  apologise.  Be 
sides,  the  only  place  I  know  where  you  can  get  the  in 
formation  you  ask  is  the  bureau  of  vital  statistics." 

Impatiently  Bradish  straightened. 

"That  has  nothing  to  do  with  it." 

Austen  smiled,  or  affected  to  smile.  "Come  now. 
You  ought  to  see  that  it  has  everything  to  do  with  it. 
If  you  take  a  look,  you  will  find  there,  entered  and 
filed,  the  certificate  of  your  wife's  decease." 

Bradish  flushed.  I  could  see  he  was  trying  to  hold 
in  and  I  could  see  too  he  was  having  a  job  of  it. 

"I  don't  want  that.  What  I  want  is  to  know  what 
became  of  her  after  you  abducted  her." 

Austen  took  up  the  paper-cutter  again.  I  thought 
he  was  stumped  but  he  wasn't. 

"Whom  do  you  mean  by  her?"  he  surprisingly  asked. 

For  the  first  time  Bradish  raised  his  voice. 

"Here!  Don't  quibble.  You  know  I  mean  my 
wife." 

Austen  made  a  pass  with  the  knife. 

"It  is  hardly  a  quibble  to  repeat  that  she  is  dead." 

Bradish  was  looking  him  straight  in  the  eyes,  he 
was  looking  straight  at  Bradish  and  he  added: 


206  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"I  can  tell  you  nothing  else." 

At  that  Bradish  sort  of  nodded.  "Very  good  then. 
If  you  won't  answer  me  as  man  to  man,  you  will  an 
swer  me  as  defendant  to  plaintiff." 

Austen  raised  his  eyebrows.  Perhaps  he  did  not 
understand.  I  am  sure  that  I  did  not. 

"You  may  not  know  it,"  Bradish  continued,  "but  I 
have  leased  the  manor.  The  vault  is  my  property  and 
you  effected  a  felonious  entry  into  it." 

It  was  a  false  move.  A  threat  is  always  that.  Be 
sides  how  was  any  action  possible?  The  jury  were 
yet  to  be  born  that  would  accept  Aly's  story.  At  once 
I  started  to  interrupt  but,  before  I  could,  Austen  was 
shrugging  his  shoulders. 

"The  sooner  I  have  your  complaint,  the  sooner  you 
will  have  my  answer." 

Bradish  put  on  his  hat.     "Is  that  your  last  word?" 

Austen  turned  to  me. 

"Can't  you  help  a  bit,  Poole?  You  were  at  the 
funeral.  You  saw  Mrs.  Bradish  in  her  coffin." 

"Yes,"  I  answered,  "but  I  have  seen  her  since,  or  at 
least " 

I  was  about  to  qualify  it  and  say  if  I  had  not  seen 
her  I  had  seen  her  ghost,  instead  of  which  I  screamed. 
I  saw  something  else  and,  at  what  I  saw,  it  may  be 
that  my  hair  stood  on  end  for  I  could  feel  my  flesh 
creep. 

There,  before  me,  before  Bradish,  but  not  before 
Austen  whose  back  was  turned,  was  Nelly  Chilton. 

I  say  Nelly  Chilton.  It  was  she  or  her  ghost.  The 
door  of  the  cupboard  had  opened  and  there  she  stood. 

A  second  only.  Clothed  sepulchrally  in  white,  in 
stantly  she  vanished. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  207 

In  screaming,  I  jumped  and  so  violently  that  I  over 
turned  the  chair.  Stupidly,  I  stopped  to  raise  it.  It 
took  but  a  moment,  yet  as  I  started  and  screamed, 
Bradish  cleared  the  table,  swung  himself  clear  over  it 
and  dashed  into  the  cupboard  in  which  she — or  it — 
had  disappeared. 

I  had  just  a  glimpse  of  Austen  turning  and  looking 
amazedly  after  him.  He  had  not  seen  the  phantom 
but  I  had  and,  with  no  conscious  motive,  yet  propelled, 
I  now  think,  by  sheer  nervous  excitement,  I  bolted, 
flung  myself  in  the  cupboard. 

There  was  no  one  there ! 

I  heard,  or  thought  I  heard  something,  the  sound 
of  an  object  that  had  fallen,  but  I  was  too  rattled  to 
locate  it,  too  confused  to  be  sure. 

On  either  side  coats  were  hanging.  At  the  back 
there  were  more,  but  of  Bradish  not  a  sign,  of  the 
phantom,  not  a  trace.  Save  for  myself  and  the  hang 
ing  garments  in  which  feverishly  I  felt,  save  too  for 
the  ceiling  and  floor,  save  these  things  and  myself,  the 
cupboard  was  empty.  There  was  no  one.  Together 
the  quick  and  the  dead  had  gone. 

My  forehead  was  wet,  my  hands  were  moist.  I  got 
out  my  handkerchief  and  reentered  the  room. 

That  also  was  empty. 

"Well,"  I  nervously  mumbled,  "I'll  be  damned!" 


XXVIII 

ON  the  table  was  the  paper-cutter.  It  was  not  very 
helpful  and  I  got  down  and  looked  under  the  table. 
For  all  I  found  I  might  as  well  have  looked  out  of  the 
window.  Besides  it  was  a  bit  awkward.  While  I 


208  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

was  still  on  my  knees  and  before  I  could  rise,  the 
door,  not  of  the  cupboard  but  of  the  room,  opened  and 
Austen's  man  came  in. 

"I  am  taking  a  walk,"  I  told  him. 

"Exactly,  sir." 

He  spoke  as  though  crawling  about  on  all  fours  was 
perfectly  natural  and  I  stood  up. 

"I  was  looking  for  Mr.  Austen.  I  will  thank  you 
to  tell  him  I  am  still  here." 

Civilly  he  considered  me. 

"I  will  see,  sir,  but  I  think  Mr.  Austen  just  went 
out." 

"Out!"  I  repeated. 

But  he  too  had  gone. 

I  sat  down  and  tried  to  pull  myself  together.  In 
spite  of  the  ease  with  which  I  had  invented  a  prome 
nade,  I  was  unstrung,  nervous  as  a  witch,  dripping 
with  perspiration,  and,  as  I  raised  my  hand  to  wipe 
my  face,  it  did  what  no  hand  of  mine  had  ever  done, 
it  shook. 

I  got  up,  went  to  the  sideboard,  helped  myself  from 
a  decanter,  spilling  a  little  of  the  contents,  and  heard 
the  glass  click  against  my  teeth. 

This  won't  do,  I  reflected. 

To  steady  my  nerves,  I  evolved  a  few  platitudes, 
among  others  that,  if  I  had  seen  a  ghost,  I  ought  to 
applaud  my  luck  instead  of  being  alarmed  by  it. 

The  comfort  of  that  was  mediocre.  For,  admitting 
the  ghost,  what  had  become  of  Bradish?  His  de- 
materialisation  was  a  phenomenon  for  which  nothing 
in  occultism  had  prepared  me.  I  was  necessarily  aware, 
as  everyone  else  is,  that,  by  virtue  of  certain  austeri 
ties,  an  adept  can  disentangle  himself  from  the  body 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  209 

and  swim  into  the  astral,  but,  even  so,  he  has  to  leave 
his  body  behind  and,  so  far  as  I  could  discover, 
Bradish  had  not  left  so  much  as  his  hat.  On  the  other 
hand  there  are,  or  there  used  to  be,  stories  of  people 
that  had  the  gift  of  becoming  invisible.  But  the 
precedent  helped  me  no  more  than  the  paper-cutter. 
Bradish  had  no  such  gift. 

I  peered  at  the  cupboard.  For  all  I  knew  to  the 
contrary  there  might  be  some  power  there,  a  power 
of  which  I  had  never  heard,  some  force  unimaginable 
and  inexplicable  that  had  whisked  him  away.  But 
whisked  him  where?  It  would  have  to  land  him  some 
where.  It  could  not  gobble  him  up. 

These  platitudes,  however  long  in  the  telling,  came 
at  me  in  flashes.  They  occupied  but  a  moment  and  in 
peering  at  the  cupboard  I  approached  it  and  reached 
in  a  tentative  hand,  bracing  myself  to  snatch  it  back 
at  any  snatching  forward.  Then,  conscious  presently 
that  it  was  unmolested,  that  there  was  no  attempt  to 
whisk  me,  I  put  a  foot  in. 

Except  for  such  light  as  came  from  the  window 
behind  me,  it  was  dark  and  I  lit  a  match.  I  could  see 
then  that  on  either  side  were  wooden  bars  from  which, 
on  hangers,  the  coats  hung.  At  the  back  there  were 
hooks  and  more  coats.  As  for  the  floor,  I  could  feel 
it.  It  was  unyielding  as  rock.  I  looked  up.  The 
ceiling,  obviously  there,  was  out  of  reach.  Then  the 
match  burned  my  fingers.  I  dropped  it  and  felt  behind 
the  coats,  not  to  find  Bradish,  I  knew  he  was  not  there, 
but  with  some  imbecile  idea  of  testifying  afterward 
that  I  had  done  so. 

By  this  time  I  was  relatively  collected,  reasonably 
cool,  yet  conscious  of  an  odd  feeling  in  my  head.  It 


210  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

was  as  though  a  little  top  were  spinning  there.  With 
that  consciousness,  memory  raised  a  latch.  I  was  back 
in  Mayfair,  where  a  woman  was  telling  me  of  some 
friend,  a  typical  Englishman  who,  for  a  bet,  had 
passed  the  night  in  a  house  said  to  be  haunted,  and 
who,  the  next  morning,  was  taken  from  it  raving  mad. 
Then  at  once  logic  raised  another  latch.  I  realised 
that  for  that  Englishman  to  go  mad  he  must  have  been 
confronted  by  some  unimaginable  horror.  Confront 
ing  me  were  coats.  The  deduction  followed.  Nothing 
very  horrifying  there.  On  the  other  hand  there  was 
something  so  baffling  that  it  amounted  nearly  to  the 
same  thing  and  in  view  of  that  top  I  wondered  if  my 
brain  was  about  to  tip.  Before  it  could,  I  jumped. 
I  jumped  as  a  cat  does  at  the  unexpected.  I  had  heard 
somebody,  or  something,  and  in  jumping  I  wheeled. 
Another  awkward  moment.  There  again  was  that 
gnome. 

"I  was  looking  for  Mr.  Bradish,"  I  told  him. 

"Exactly,  sir." 

On  this  occasion  he  spoke  as  though  his  master's 
friends  invariably  played  hide  and  seek  whenever  they 
came  to  see  him. 

"Where  is  he?"  I  added. 

Respectfully  he  considered  me.  "Where  is  who, 
sir?" 

"Mr.  Bradish?" 

"I  don't  think  I  know  the  gentleman,  sir." 

"You  were  in  the  hall  when  I  came  in  here  with  Mr. 
Austen,  weren't  you?" 

"In  the  hall,  yes,  sir." 

"There  was  nother  man  with  us.  That  was  Mr. 
Bradish.  Have  you  any  idea  where  he  is?" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  211 

He  wiped  his  civil  mouth.  "Excuse  me,  sir,  I  didn't 
see  any  other  gentleman." 

I  had  abandoned  the  cupboard.  I  was  standing  by 
the  table  and  I  had  taken  up  the  paper-cutter  which  I 
was  trying  to  use  as  a  fan.  But  at  that  I  dropped  it. 

"Look  here,"  I  said.  "I  am  speaking  of  a  man  who 
came  in  here  a  few  minutes  ago  with  Mr.  Austen  and 
myself.  Mr.  Austen  opened  the  door  for  us.  You 
must  have  seen  him." 

"Yes,  sir.     Mr.  Austen  was  going  out." 

"I  am  not  speaking  of  Mr.  Austen.  I  am  speaking 
of  the  man  who  came  in  with  me.  You  saw  him." 

"I  can't  rightly  say  I  did,  sir." 

"But  you  saw  me  come  in?" 

"Yes,  sir.  I  saw  you,  sir.  You  are  the  gentleman 
that  was  under  the  table." 

"Then  do  you  mean  to  stand  there  and  tell  me  that 
apart  from  Mr.  Austen  and  myself,  you  saw  no  one 
come  in?" 

"Yes,  sir;  no,  sir." 

I  snapped  at  him,  "What  do  you  mean  by  no,  sir; 
yes,  sir?" 

But  his  civility  remained  unaffected. 

"I  don't  mean  nothing,  sir.  You  asked  me  about 
another  gentleman.  I  didn't  see  no  other  gentleman." 

He  is  an  idiot,  I  hopelessly  decided.  But  at  once, 
catching  myself  up,  I  smiled  at  him. 

"Have  you  ever  seen  a — er — a  ghost  here?" 

He  backed.  His  mouth  twitched.  But  he  was  still 
civil. 

"Will  you  be  waiting  for  Mr.  Austen,  sir?"  In 
backing,  he  turned.  At  the  door  he  turned  again. 

"If  you  don't  mind,  sir,  I  have  work  to  do." 


212  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

The  hall  took  him.  Once  more  I  was  alone  in  this 
room  in  which  a  vision  had  appeared  and  a  mortal  had 
disintegrated,  a  room  from  which,  in  fear  of  me,  a 
gnome  had  fled. 

I  sat  down.  That  top  must  have  doubled  itself.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  two  of  them  were  spinning  just 
beneath  the  pineal  gland.  Joined  to  that  was  the  sensa 
tion  which  one  has  after  a  white  night,  the  sensation 
that  the  brain,  won't  act.  I  told  myself  that  I  if  could 
put  my  head  under  a  shower,  it  would  help.  But  I 
did  not  want  to  go  ferreting  about  for  the  bathroom. 
I  knew  the  gnome  would  find  me  at  it  and,  however 
accustomed  he  might  be  to  the  vagaries  of  Austen's 
guests,  few  of  them  I  imagined  could  come  there  to 
bathe.  None  the  less  I  rather  fancied  that  if  when 
stripped  and  in  the  tub  I  had  told  him  I  was  expecting 
my  grandmother,  his  "Exactly,  sir"  would  be  as 
prompt  and  as  civil  as  before. 

At  the  picture,  nervously  I  laughed.  I  had  laughed 
at  nothing  and  what  better  reason  can  one  have  ?  Then 
again  I  laughed,  this  time  at  the  little  gnome  for  run 
ning  away.  He  must  have  thought  me  cracked,  that  is 
if  he  thought  at  all.  But  perhaps  I  am,  I  immediately 
reflected.  Perhaps  everything  that  has  occurred  has 
only  seemed  to  occur.  Even  so,  I  told  myself,  people 
are  not  mad  because  they  see  things  that  do  not  exist, 
they  are  only  mad  if  they  believe  in  them  and  I  won't. 
Yet  how  vain  that  resolution  was !  I  could  not  make 
myself  believe  that  Bradish  had  not  come  with  me. 
I  could  not  pretend  that  I  had  not  seen  him  disappear. 
The  vision  that  had  evaporated  with  him  might  be  a 
phantom  and  I  was  willing  to  let  it  go  at  that.  But 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  213 

there  was  nothing  phantasmal  about  Bradish.  None 
the  less  the  gnome  had  not  seen  him  at  all! 

But  that  is  impossible.  I  told  myself.  Either  he 
lied  or  Austen  coached  him  or 

My  mind  shot  back.  I  reconstructed  our  entry. 
Bradish,  lordly  as  usual,  had  marched  in  first.  I  had 
followed.  In  following  I  had  seen  the  servant's  head 
poked  from  a  doorway  farther  down  the  hall.  Prob 
ably,  a  moment  earlier,  he  had  seen  his  master  about 
to  leave.  Then,  hearing  voices,  he  had  looked  out 
again,  but  not  until  Bradish  had  entered  this  room. 

This  is  it,  I  reflected,  but,  I  had  to  ask  myself,  what 
did  it  matter  ?  The  complex  problem  remained.  How 
and  where  had  Bradish  gone? 

Clearly  he  was  not  under  the  table,  or  secreted  in 
the  cupboard,  and  I  wondered  whether  he  could  have 
levitated  himself  through  the  ceiling.  There  was  a 
medium  —  whom  Browning  threw  rhymes  at  —  who 
could  perform  that  little  trick,  or  at  all  events  some 
thing  similar.  But,  I  had  to  realise,  Bradish  was  no 
more  capable  of  anything  of  the  kind  than  he  was  of 
composing  a  ballet.  Even  otherwise,  what  object 
could  he  have  had?  He  had  come  with  me  to  this 
shop,  solely  that  he  might  bully  Austen.  In  that  he 
had  failed,  or  been  about  to  fail,  when  he  flung  him 
self  over  the  table  and  jumped  into  the  fourth  dimen 
sion. 

What  kind  of  behavior  was  that?  Patently,  it  had 
amazed  Austen,  as  well  it  might,  and  the  memory  of  it 
so  angered  me  that  if,  at  that  moment,  Bradish  had 
popped  back,  I  would  have  up  and  struck  him. 

No  such  luck,  however,  and  for  the  time  being  at 
any  rate,  no  possibility  of  it. 


214  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

As  that  conclusion  reached  me,  a  query  followed. 
If  there  were  no  chance  of  his  popping  then,  when 
would  he  pop  and  would  he  ever?  Had  he  definitely 
deserted  this  world? 

"But  that  is  madness !"  I  exclaimed  aloud. 

At  once,  to  put  an  accent  on  it,  if  one  were  needed, 
I  saw  that  gnome  peering  in  at  me  from  the  door.  A 
moment  only.  The  door  closed.  More  frightened 
perhaps  than  before,  again  the  harmless  wretch  had 
fled. 

I  could  not  blame  him.  First  he  had  found  me  on 
all  fours;  afterward  in  the  cupboard.  On  the  first 
occasion  I  told  him  I  was  taking  a  walk.  On  the  sec 
ond,  I  had  insisted  he  had  seen  what  he  had  not  seen 
and  I  had  enquired  about  a  ghost.  Now,  a  moment 
since,  he  had  heard  me  talking  to  myself,  talking  of 
the  madness  which  he  must  have  suspected.  Instantly, 
I  could  hear  the  clanging  ambulance,  feel  the  strait- 
jacket,  see  the  psychopathic  ward! 

Unstrung  as  I  was,  it  alarmed  me.  I  sprang  up, 
grabbed  my  hat  and  stick  and  with  the  idea  of  doing 
something,  of  going  somewhere,  of  enlisting  some 
body's  aid,  I  hurried  on  and  out  and  down  the  stair 
to  the  street  where,  comfortably,  Fletcher  waited. 

I  had  forgotten  him  utterly  and  said  as  much. 

"Thank  heaven  you  are  here !  Have  you  seen  Mr. 
Bradish?" 

He  touched  his  cap.  "Why  no,  sir.  Not  since  he 
went  in  with  you." 

"You  are  sure  he  hasn't  come  out?" 

"Positive,  sir." 

"Fletcher,  look  here.     He  has  disappeared." 

His  eyes  bulged.    "Mr.  Bradish  has?" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  215 

"We  went  in  to  see  a  man  and  while  Mr.  Bradish 
was  talking  to  him  all  of  a  sudden  he  wasn't  there.  I 
don't  know  what  to  do." 

Fletcher's  eyes  bulged  wider.  But  any  hypothesis 
save  one,  that  I  was  drunk,  was  clearly  beyond  him. 
I  saw  it  and  motioned. 

"Here,  let's  go  to  Dr.  Cally.  He  may  tell  us  how 
to  act." 

On  the  way,  I  thought  of  Aly  and  wondered  whether 
what  she  had  seen,  or  thought  she  had  seen,  were  true, 
feeling,  as  I  wondered,  that  it  were  better  if  it  was 
not;  though  better  still,  better  far  it  would  be  if,  when 
Bradish  entered  the  vault,  he  had  found  his  bride  there, 
found  her  lover  with  her,  found  him  dead,  found  her 
dead,  found  them  dead  together,  and  when,  ragingly, 
he  had  tried  to  tear  them  apart,  they  had  crumbled 
to  dust  before  him.  A  climax  such  as  that  would,  it 
seemed  to  me,  be  more  f atefully  poetic  than  the  melo 
drama  which  Aly  had  related. 

But  now  we  were  at  Cally's,  who,  it  appeared,  was 
out.  It  was  that  nigger  of  his  who  told  me  and  surly 
enough  he  was  about  it.  He  did  not  know  where  Dr. 
Cally  was,  he  knew  nothing  and  he  looked  ready  and 
eager  to  slam  the  door  in  my  face. 

Fortunately,  I  know  just  how  to  tame  a  brute  of 
that  kind  and,  quick  as  a  wink,  I  pulled  a  roll  of  bills 
straight  at  him. 

"Throw  out  your  hand." 

The  effect  was  magical.  Instantly  a  sullen  lout  be 
came  all  teeth  and  eyes.  In  his  erebean  face  I  could 
even  detect  gleams  of  intelligence. 

"Find  him.  Tell  him  it  is  a  matter  of  life  and 
death.  I  will  be  at  the  Buck  Club." 


216  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

Confident  then,  that  unless  Cally  had  also  evapo 
rated,  he  would  shortly  materialise,  I  flew  down  the 
steps,  hopped  in  the  car  and  told  Fletcher  to  drive  to 
the  club  where,  when  presently  I  entered  it,  I  ran 
around  like  a  chicken  with  its  head  off. 

In  the  main  room  I  saw  no  one  to  whom  I  could 
turn  and,  leaving  it,  I  did  what  I  rarely  do,  I  looked 
in  my  letter  box.  There  was  a  chance,  slim  enough 
in  all  conscience,  yet  still  a  chance  that  from  some  rec 
ondite  region,  Bradish  might  be  trying  to  communicate 
with  me. 

The  box  was  tolerably  stuffed,  but  mainly  with  cir 
culars  from  among  which  I  sifted  two  letters,  one  of 
which  contained  a  request  for  my  autograph.  I 
dropped  it.  Immediately  a  boy  in  a  slashed  waistcoat 
sprang  from  nowhere,  picked  it  up  and  gave  it  back 
to  me.  I  dropped  it  again  and  put  my  foot  on  it.  The 
other  letter  was  from  my  publishers  who  said  that  five 
thousand  was  offered  for  the  picture  rights  of  my  last 
iniquity  and  would  I  see  them  about  it? 

Mere  starvation  wages,  I  thought  and  thought  no 
more  about  it,  for  the  time  being  that  is,  and  hurried 
on  through  the  billiard  room  to  the  bar  where  there 
were  two  men  whose  names  I  might  have  remembered 
but  whose  faces  were  blanks. 

One  of  them  had  the  agreeable  air  of  having  just 
stepped  from  a  bandbox.  He  invited  me  to  drink. 

I  ordered  vichy. 

The  other  man,  who  reeked  of  polo,  addressed  me 
in  a  throaty  voice. 

"Whatcher  up  to  now,  Poole?  Writin'  somethin' 
noo?" 

I  barked  at  him.    "Writing  something?    I  am  living 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  217 

something,  something  that  would  bowl  you  over,  bore 
holes  in  you  and  stuff  you  full  of  nightmare.  Do  you 
know  Bradish?" 

"The  spider  chap?    What  of  him?" 

I  gulped  the  vichy.  "He  was  with  me  one  moment 
and  vanished  the  next.  Is  Brevoort  here?" 

Lightly,  with  a  forefinger,  the  other  man  motioned. 

"There's  a  boy  trying  to  speak  to  you." 

I  looked  about.  The  slashed  waistcoat  had  ap 
proached. 

"Dr.  Kelly,  sir.    He's  in  the  hall." 

Without  one  of  the  amenities  of  life,  I  abandoned 
those  men  and  hurried  on  and  out  to  where  Cally 
stood. 

He  plucked  at  his  beard.  "You've  been  corrupting 
my  servant.  He  says  you  gave  him  thirty  dollars." 

"See  here!  Bradish  has  disappeared.  You  and  I 
have  got  to  find  him." 

He  adjusted  his  glasses.  "Disappearances  are  de 
ceptive.  How  did  it  happen?" 

"I  went  with  him  to  call  on  a  man  and,  while  there, 
a  ghost  appeared  and  Bradish  jumped  into  the  fourth 
dimension." 

"Where  did  these  commonplace  incidents  occur?" 

"At  Austen's." 

"Was  Bradish  acquainted  with  the  ghost?" 

"It  was  Nelly  Chilton's." 

Mephistophelianly  he  eyed  me,  not  as  though  he 
were  questioning  my  sanity,  but  rather  as  though  he 
had  always  thought  me  demented. 

"You  saw  it  too  then?    Where  did  it  come  from?" 

"A  cupboard,  and  look  here,  no  sooner  did  it  ap- 


218  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

pear   than   it   disappeared   and   Bradish   disappeared 
also." 

"In  the  cupboard?" 

"Didn't  you  hear  me?  I  dashed  in  there  the  next 
instant.  There  was  nobody  there,  nobody,  nothing, 
coats  only." 

He  lit  one  of  his  vile  cigars. 

"Poole,  always  I  have  admired  you.  But  never  be 
fore  have  you  been  as  brilliant.  Personally,  fool  that 
I  am,  I  have  regarded  the  fourth  dimension  as  an 
example  of  mathemathical  hysterics.  But  to  you  it  is 
a  cupboard  full  of  old  clothes.  That  is  what  I  call 
originality.  Now " 

I  grabbed  him  by  the  arm.  "Stow  all  that.  We 
have  got  to  get  back  there  and " 

He  shook  me  off.  "If  you  take  my  advice,  you 
will  leave  things  as  they  are." 

I  could  have  torn  my  hair,  torn  his.  Again  I 
grabbed  him. 

"I  don't  want  your  advice.  If  I  had  elephantiasis 
I  wouldn't  take  it.  I  want  your  help." 

"Why  don't  you  knock  me  down?" 

He  said  it  with  a  hateful  affection  of  patience,  the 
resigned  patience  of  the  long  suffering,  and  it  infu 
riated  me. 

"I'll  be  shot  if  I  don't,  if  you  won't  come  along." 

"A  lamb  led  by  a  lion,"  I  heard  him  protest  at  the 
doorkeeper  who  regarded  us  both  with  professional 
stolidity. 

But  at  last  I  had  him  in  the  car  and  after  directing 
Fletcher,  I  went  over  it  again,  but  this  time  in  full. 

"What  do  you  make  of  it?"  I  concluded.  "To  me 
it  is  a  nightmare." 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  219 

"Can  you  keep  a  secret?" 

"Yes. 

"Well,  I  can't.     Your  nightmare  is  a  mare's  nest." 

"How  a  mare's  nest?" 

"You  are  a  novelist,  I  believe." 

"You  mean  I  have  invented  all  this?" 

"No,  that  would  require  ability.  You  have  merely 
twisted  things  crooked  and  then  frightened  yourself 
with  them." 

"Yes,"  I  admitted.  "That  is  only  commonsense. 
The  whole  affair  has  rattled  me  so  that  I  can't  think 
straight." 

"Totally  unnecessary  to  tell  me  that,  Poole.  More 
over,  if  I  were  you,  I  wouldn't  talk  of  commonsense. 
It  might  seem  boastful." 

I  found  no  adequate  retort.  Besides,  what  he  said 
was  natural  enough.  He  did  not  believe  me.  How 
could  he?  How  could  anyone  believe  my  cock-and-bull 
story?  How  for  that  matter  could  I  prove  it?  I  had 
no  witness  except  Austen,  who  might  deny  everything, 
and  that  gnome  who  had  not  seen  Bradish  at  all. 

But  now  the  car  was  veering.  Into  the  street  of 
obscure  calamities  it  swam  and,  at  the  Leah-like  house, 
we  alighted. 

XXIX 

IN  the  hall,  on  the  way  up,  Cally  looked  at  his 
watch  and  blandly,  with  his  abominable  unconcern,  re 
marked  that  he  had  an  appointment  at  nine. 

"At  nine !"  I  exclaimed.  "It  must  be  midnight  now." 

"Two  minutes  after  eight  precisely." 


220  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

I  stared.  It  was  my  turn.  I  did  not  believe  him. 
It  was  incredible  that  all  that  had  happened  could  have 
been  comprised  into  an  hour's  space. 

"Seeing  more  ghosts?"  he  obligingly  enquired. 

But  now  we  were  on  the  landing  above.  It  was 
darker  than  before,  yet,  without  apparent  effort,  he 
found  the  button. 

The  gnome  opened.  Cally  said  something,  asking 
for  Austen  I  think,  and  I  went  on  with  him  into  the 
sitting-room  where  the  evaporation  had  occurred. 

Previously,  it  had  not  been  lighted.  It  was  then 
and  Cally  indicated  the  cupboard  of  which  the  door 
had  been  closed. 

"Is  that  your  fourth  dimension  ?" 

Suddenly  I  felt  very  tired.  Joined  to  the  fatigue 
was  a  sense  of  helplessness.  I  felt  that  Cally  would 
be  of  no  use  whatever  and  I  cursed  myself  for  not 
having  thought  to  subvention  Aly.  She  could  have 
psychometrised  the  cupboard  and  told  me  what  hap 
pened  when  Bradish  disappeared. 

From  the  chair  on  which  I  had  dropped,  I  looked 
about.  Cally  had  opened  the  cupboard  and  I  saw 
him  go  in.  Then  I  lost  sight  of  him  and  I  wondered — 
though  with  that  indifference  which  lassitude  brings — 
whether  he  too  had  been  whisked  away. 

Yet  almost  at  once  he  showed  himself  and  beckoned. 
I  got  up  and  went  to  him.  Preceding  me,  he  re-entered 
the  cupboard  and  pushed  at  the  back.  Silently  it 
parted.  An  unimagined  door  had  opened.  I  was 
looking  into  another  room. 

A  foot  or  two  beyond  was  a  trunk  and  beside  it  a 
hat.  I  saw  that,  saw  too  something  else.  Across  the 
room  was  another  door.  As  I  looked  it  also  opened. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  221 

From  behind  it  a  face,  ageless  and  sexless,  peered  and 
I  heard  a  sexless  and  ageless  voice. 

"In  Christian  charity,  will  you  go?" 

But  the  voice,  however  unearthly,  was  human.  The 
room  into  which  I  looked  was  real.  Then  at  once  I 
was  in  darkness.  Cally  had  withdrawn  his  hand.  In 
stantly  the  cupboard's  back  exit  had  closed  and  I  real 
ised  how  it  was  that  when  Bradish  dashed  in  there,  I 
had  missed  him  by  not  more  than  a  hair. 

"There  is  your  fourth  dimension.  Take  a  jump  in 
yourself.  If  you  don't  find  Bradish,  it  is  because  he 
has  gone.  I  am  going  too.  Some  folks  have  their 
living  to  make." 

It  was  Cally  of  course.  I  had  no  answer  for  him, 
nor  any  surprise  at  his  familiarity  with  the  lay  of  the 
land.  I  took  it  that  he  had  stumbled  on  it  by  accident, 
as  I  might  have,  if  I  had  been  less  rattled  when  Bradish 
disappeared.  Then,  at  once,  with  a  push  of  my  own, 
I  passed  through. 

At  the  right  was  a  sofa,  behind  it  a  window.  Oppo 
site  the  sofa,  a  yard  or  two  away,  was  a  table.  On  it 
was  a  book  and  above  it  a  light.  Nearby  were  two 
chairs.  Save  for  a  small  rug,  that  trunk  and  the  hat, 
the  floor  was  bare.  These  things  I  absorbed  at  a 
glance.  What  alone  among  them  detained  me  was  the 
sofa. 

There  sat  Bradish.  He  was  holding  his  leg  as 
though  it  were  a  guitar. 

The  attitude  exasperated  me.  If  a  last  straw  were 
needed  there  it  was  and  I  yelped. 

"What  are  you  doing?" 

He  motioned  at  the  opposite  wall.  "Nelly  is  in 
there.  I  would  have  had  her,  I  nearly  had  her,  she 


222  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

was  just  ahead  of  me,  making  for  that  door,  when  I 
tripped  and  fell." 

It  was  too  much  and  I  let  go. 

"You  are  always  tumbling  over  yourself  and  always 
at  the  wrong  moment.  It  is  a  pity  you  did  not  break 
your  neck." 

He  grimaced.  "I  nearly  did.  I  fell  over  that  trunk 
and  twisted  my  bad  ankle.  The  pain  must  have 
knocked  me.  When  I  came  to,  I  was  on  the  floor." 

I  gave  it  to  him  again. 

"I  thought  you  were  dead,  confound  you.  When  I 
saw  what  you  saw,  I  sprang  in  the  air  and  screamed 
like  an  octopus,  but  you  dashed  in  here  and  fainted 
from  sheer  bravado.  Come  along  out  of  this." 

"Not  till  I  see  Nelly." 

"You  intend  to  stay  here  for  the  rest  of  your  born 
days?" 

"I  intend  to  get  at  Nelly  if  I  have  to  break  down 
every  door  in  the  place." 

"Nice  blackguardly  program." 

He  threw  out  his  chin.  "Kid  gloves,  eh?  I  have 
worn  them  too  long." 

As  he  spoke,  he  lowered  his  leg,  got  to  his  feet, 
winced  visibly  and  as  visibly  stared,  not  at  me,  at 
something  or  someone  behind  me. 

I  turned.  In  the  doorway,  through  which  that  un 
earthly  face  had  peered,  stood  a  man  whom  I  remem 
bered  having  seen  at  the  funeral.  Obviously  a  man  of 
the  world  and  not  of  its  neighbourhood,  as  some 
worldly  men  are,  he  had  that  air  of  extreme  distinction 
which  certain  New  Yorkers  used  to  possess  and  which 
now  is  gone  forever.  Another  lost  art. 

He  bowed  to  Bradish.     "My  name  is  Chilton.    He 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  223 

turned  to  me.     "Mr.  Poole,  I  believe.     Won't  you 
both  be  seated?" 

There  could  be  but  one  Chilton — Nelly's  father. 
There  he  stood.  Bradish  sank  back  on  the  sofa.  I 
took  a  chair.  There  were  but  two  chairs.  He  took 
the  other. 

"Mr.  Bradish,"  he  resumed.  "It  was  my  intention 
to  call  on  you  tomorrow,  for  in  returning  here,  I  hardly 
expected  to  find  you.  Austen,  who  went  in  search  of 
rne,  told  me  of  your  visit.  He  told  me  also  what  you 
said.  In  what  manner  you  discovered  what  you  did 
discover  is  incomprehensible.  It  is  also  unfortunate. 
He  paused  and  continued:  "What  I  have  to  say  to 
you  intimately  concerns  my  daughter." 

I  made  for  the  door.  "Mr.  Chilton,  I  am  your  very 
obedient  servant." 

At  once  he  protested.  "No,  no,  I  beg  of  you. 
Please  do  not  go.  At  least  for  a  moment.  I ' 

"Your  daughter,"  Bradish  heatedly  cut  in,  "is  in  the 
next  room.  She " 

"My  daughter  is  dead,"  the  old  man  interrupted. 

At  that  the  lion  roared.  "She  isn't!  She  can't  be! 
She  never  has  been!  I  don't  believe  it.  I've  seen 
her." 

Cheerlessly  the  old  man  eyed  him.  "When  you  saw 
her  she  told  you  she  was  dead.  She  spoke  the  truth. 
Civilly  she  has  no  existence." 

"What  do  you  mean,  sir?"  Bradish  cried  at  him. 

The  old  man's  right  hand  had  been  ungloved. 
Slowly  he  removed  the  other  glove. 

"What  the  law  is  here  I  do  not  know,  but  I  do  know 
that  on  the  Continent  a  death  certificate,  properly  en 
tered,  is  incapable  of  revision." 


224  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

The  spider  then  seemed  to  be  digging  into  Bradish's 
face. 

"It  cannot  be  that  you  propose  to  stand  on  that?" 

The  old  man  turned  to  me.  "I  stand  on  nothing." 
He  turned  to  Bradish.  "None  the  less " 

"What?" 

"I  ask  you  to  relinquish  her." 

Bradish  glared.  The  expression  is  cheap.  I  can 
think  of  none  other  that  is  as  adequate. 

"Not  to  her  lover!"  The  five  syllables  he  tore 
from  his  mouth  and  flung  them  so  violently  that  the 
spider  seemed  about  to  fling  itself  with  them.  Nor 
had  he  done.  With  the  same  violence  he  gestured  at 
the  cupboard.  "In  that  room  in  there  I  surprised  her 
going  to  him." 

But  the  violence  served  only  to  heighten  that  air  of 
distinction. 

"Mr.  Bradish,  no  man  should  speak,  as  you  have 
spoken,  to  a  girl's  father.  Yet  I  do  not  venture  to 
reprove  you.  Presently  you  will  reprove  yourself. 
Meanwhile  you  will  allow  me  to  correct  you.  When 
you  surprised  my  daughter  in  the  adjoining  room,  it 
was  in  search  of  me  she  was  going.  Since  Austen  first 
took  this  apartment  for  me,  very  often  I  have  sat 
there,  usually  with  him,  but  also  with  Dr.  Cally,  who 
has  been  attending  her." 

And  that,  I  reflected,  is  how  tricky  little  Cally  knew 
the  lay  of  the  land. 

"As  Dr.  Cally  is  aware,  though  you  are  not,  she  is 
dying.  The  dying,  Mr.  Bradish,  do  not  act  in  the 
manner  which  you  have  asserted." 

Again  the  wounded  lion  roared. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  225 

"Dying!  It  is  impossible.  Only  a  while  ago, 
she " 

Protestingly  the  old  man  had  motioned.  "I  must 
ask  you  to  hear  me.  For  some  time  I  was  abroad.  It 
was  only  a  few  days  before  my  daughter's  marriage 
that  I  returned  to  this  country.  She  was  then  inter 
ested  in  Austen  as  she  always  had  been.  To  my  knowl 
edge  she  had  never  looked,  as  the  phrase  is,  at  another 
man.  Her  marriage  to  you  was  therefore  a  surprise 
to  me.  She  has  since  told  me  that  her  mother  so  rep 
resented  matters  with  which  you  are  familiar,  that  she 
had  no  other  recourse.  Mr.  Poolc,  will  you  care  to 
smoke?" 

In  speaking  he  produced  a  cigarette  case,  which  he 
offered  to  me,  offered  to  Bradish,  who  shook  his  head. 
I  thanked  him  and  took  one.  He  also  took  one  and 
resumed. 

"You  will  appreciate  in  a  moment  why  I  enter  into 
circumstances  which,  without  reflecting  in  any  way  on 
you,  are  painful  to  us  both.  But  then  the  whole  matter 
is  painful,  far  more  so  than  you  know.  Have  you  a 
match,  Mr.  Poole?" 

I  struck  one  which  I  gave  him.  He  thanked  me, 
lighted  his  cigarette  and  motioned  at  Bradish. 

"I  love  Nelly.  She  is  the  one  human  being  I  do 
love.  A  sacrifice  for  her  would  not  be  a  sacrifice,  it 
would  be  a  joy.  I  can  make  none.  There  is  none  to 
be  made.  You  ask  if  I  proposed  to  stand  on  the  death 
certificate.  I  can  only  stand  and  look  on,  stand  and 
wring  my  hands." 

The  gloves  which  he  held  he  dropped,  bent  over 
and  recovered  them. 

"Mr.  Bradish,  you  married  a  girl  whom  you  have 


226  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

lost  through  no  fault  of  yours,  through  no  fault  of 
hers.  Be  good  enough  to  keep  that  in  mind.  But  you 
have  lost  her  as  I  have,  as  we  all  have,  for  we  have 
lost  her  forever." 

Then  again  the  wounded  lion  roared. 

"It  is  preposterous!    I  don't  believe  it!" 

The  atmosphere  was  stifling.  Charged  with  grief, 
with  anger,  with  suspense,  it  had  us  all  by  the  throat. 
I  was  about  to  go  and  throw  open  the  window,  but  the 
old  man  was  speaking. 

"Civilly  she  is  dead  and  nominally " 

He  broke  off.  For  a  moment,  resolutely  he  closed 
his  mouth.  Then  at  once,  with  a  gesture  of  excuse,  he 
looked  at  Bradish. 

"I  again  ask  you  to  relinquish  her." 

Again  Bradish  flung  it  at  him.  "And  I  repeat,  I 
will  not  relinquish  my  wife  to  her  lover." 

Mr.  Chilton  looked  at  me  and  though  years  have 
gone  by  since  then,  that  look  seems  to  me  still  the 
most  despairful  that  I  ever  saw.  But  precisely  as  he 
had  mastered  himself  a  moment  earlier,  he  mastered 
himself  then.  The  air  of  extreme  distinction  returned 
and  it  was  actually  with  a  smile,  the  smile  of  a  man  of 
the  world  to  whom  nothing  is  important,  that  he  turned 
anew  to  Bradish. 

"I  fear  you  will  have  to  relinquish  her  to  her  lover, 
for  her  lover  is  Christ." 

Even  then  I  did  not  get  it.  Nor  did  Bradish.  He 
blazed. 

"Either  you  are  insane,  sir,  or  I  am." 

"No,  not  that,"  the  old  man  still  with  that  smile 
replied.  "But  you  are  wretched  and  angry  and  I  am 
wretched  and  sad.  Let  me  tell  you.  During  the 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  227 

funeral,  my  daughter's  consciousness  returned.  But 
with  that  consciousness  was  another,  perhaps  the  most 
pitiful  and  perhaps,  too,  the  most  horrible  that  a  mor 
tal  can  experience.  She  heard  the  service,  smelt  the 
tuberoses,  knew  where  she  was,  knew  that  she  was 
assisting  at  her  own  funeral  and  she  could  not  speak, 
she  could  not  stir.  Catalepsy  in  paralysing  the  nerve 
centres  had  made  her  rigid.  She  was  unable  to  move 
an  eyelid.  Perhaps  you  can  imagine  how  she  felt. 
I  do  not  want  to." 

The  smile  had  gone.     Cheerlessly  he  continued. 

"That  night,  as  you  have  since  discovered,  Austen 
rescued  her.  But  the  rescue  itself  was  entirely  fortu 
itous.  He  had  previously  arranged  that  the  coffin 
should  not  be  closed  and  that  arrangement,  which  had 
in  view  a  last  visit  to  her,  was  merely  one  of  senti 
ment.  But  when  he  saw  her,  when  he  touched  her,  it 
seemed  to  him  that  she  could  not  be  dead  and  he 
brought  her  to  me  here  and  sent  for  Dr.  Cally." 

"Yes,"  I  said,  and  I  said  it  only  for  the  sake  of 
saying  something.  "Cally  told  me  of  a  case  of  cata 
lepsy.  He  did  not  tell  me  whose." 

"We  begged  him  not  to.  Meanwhile,  after  he  had 
revived  her,  she  said  she  saw  the  light.  She " 

He  broke  off.  Again  the  room  was  being  invaded, 
this  time  by  Austen,  who  nodded  at  us  and  seated  him 
self  on  the  trunk. 

The  old  man  glanced  at.  him,  turned,  straightened 
and  looked  at  Bradish,  and  what  a  lookl 

"Legally  my  daughter  is  dead.  Nominally  she  is 
dying.  A  Sister  of  Mercy  is  with  her  now." 

The  face  in  the  doorway,  I  thought. 

With  that  look,  he  was  adding:     "Yesterday  my 


228  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

daughter  was  received  in  the  Catholic  Church.  Shortly, 
so  far  as  the  world  is  concerned,  she  will  be  buried 
from  us  all.  Will  you  say,  for  your  saying  it  may 
give  her  an  added  peace,  will  you  say  you  relinquish 
her  now  before  she  begins  the  novitiate  that  ends  with 
the  veil?" 

It  was  too  suffocating.  On  the  table  at  my  elbow 
was  a  book,  a  breviary  as  I  then  discovered.  But  the 
lines  were  blurred.  I  could  not  see  them.  What  I 
did  see  was  that  girl,  the  cited  beauty,  bidding  farewell 
to  love,  to  life;  taking  the  black  veil  which  is  a  white 
shroud.  The  picture  was  the  most  desolate  I  had  ever 
seen.  Yet,  at  once,  beneath  it,  those  words,  which  are 
so  curiously  radiant,  shimmered  like  thin  flames: 
"Behold,  I  make  all  things  new!" 

For  her,  yes;  not  in  this  life  certainly,  but  in  the 
next  and  probably  in  her  lives  to  follow,  all  things 
broken  would  be  made  complete  and  she  would  find 
again  things  vanished. 

But  for  Bradish,  what  could  life  hold  except  the  tan- 
talian  torture  of  knowing  her  alive  and  yet  dead  to 
him?  Again  I  wondered  what  sin,  enigmatic,  anterior, 
unknown,  could  have  thrust  him  in  those  halls  where 
expiation  would  walk  ever  at  his  side,  sit  with  him 
when  he  sat  and,  in  sleep,  lie  with  him  when  sleep  he 
could. 

I  turned  to  look  at  him.  He  was  no  longer  where 
he  had  been.  He  had  gone  to  the  window  where  he 
stood,  his  back  turned,  looking  out,  but  at  what? 
What  did  he  see  there  ?  It  must  have  been  something 
very  penetrant  for  in  a  moment,  when  he  turned,  the 
spider  that  had  been  digging  and  tearing  at  his  face 
had  yellowed  and  the  face  itself  was  drawn  and  grey. 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  229 

From  the  night,  age  may  have  reached  and  touched 
him.  Yet  also,  another  presence  may  have  touched 
not  him  alone  but  his  soul.  So  I  thought.  I  was 
entirely  in  error.  At  the  moment  I  did  not  realise 
that,  only  that  he  was  saying  something,  saying  it  in 
a  voice  that  rang. 

"All  right,  I  will,  and  I  am  glad  of  the  chance." 

What  on  earth  did  he  mean,  I  wondered.  In  the 
interim  I  had  lost  the  connection.  I  think  the  others 
had  also.  They  were  looking  at  him,  as  I  was,  in 
vague  surmise. 

But  at  once  and  to  my  disgust  he  became  sententious. 

"The  world  is  very  narrow." 

Martin  Tupper,  I  thought. 

Immediately  he  retrieved  himself.  "Let  the  world 
be  her  convent." 

Where  did  he  get  that?  I  asked  myself.  It  is  too 
good  for  him. 

"I  shall  ask,"  he  was  adding,  "that  we  be  divorced." 

"You  will  ask  in  vain  then,"  I  called  at  him.  "Yes 
terday,  as  I  understood  from  Mr.  Chilton,  Mrs. 
Bradish  joined  the  Church.  The  Church  does  not 
recognise  divorce." 

Impatiently  he  gestured.  "The  Church  can  grant 
an  annulment." 

Austen  sprang  up,  "Bradish " 

"We  have  been  man  and  wife  in  name  only,"  he 
uninterruptedly  continued.  "In  the  existing  circum 
stances  that  might  not  be  enough.  But  there  are  ante 
cedent  circumstances  that  will  be." 

"Bradish "  Austen  again  began. 

"I  married  her  under  false  pretences." 

"Jim!"  I  protested. 


23o  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

"Not  intentionally.  I  was  unaware  they  were  false. 
But  the  fact  remains  that  she  became  my  wife  because 
of  conditions  which  she  was  unaware  had  ceased  to 
exist;  that  is,  if  they  ever  existed.  If  only  for  that 
I  cannot  do  otherwise  than  release  her.  But  there  is 
another  reason,  a  personal  reason  which,  when  Mr. 
Chilton  entered  here,  I  meant  to  state  but  which  is 
superfluous  now.  As  it  is  she  can  have  the  marriage 
annulled  and  return,  not  to  death,  but  to  life.  I  wish 
her  joy." 

"Bradish,"  Austen  began  anew  and  this  time  suc 
ceeded  in  saying  it,  "it  is  what  I  expected  of  you." 

He  might,  I  thought,  have  said  less.  But  I  thought, 
too,  he  could  not  have  said  more. 

Bradish  made  no  reply.  He  did  not  even  look  at 
him.  He  ignored  him  completely  and  that  attitude, 
it  seemed  to  me — and  how  erroneously ! — was  induced 
neither  by  jealousy  nor  callousness,  but  by  that  detach 
ment  which  is  part  of  the  higher  faith,  and  a  line,  less 
radiant  than  that  other  but  more  beautiful  came  back 
to  me:  "Near  to  renunciation,  very  near,  dwelleth 
eternal  peace." 

"Now,  I'll  go,"  he  abruptly  added. 

Mr.  Chilton  had  stood  up. 

"Goodnight,"  he  rather  cavalierly  concluded. 

I  had  gone  on  to  the  trunk  where  I  got  his  hat  which 
I  gave  him  and,  Mr.  Chilton  preceding  us,  we  went 
on  to  the  door  of  this  flat  where  the  old  man,  as  he 
opened  it,  bowed  gravely. 

In  the  car,  Bradish  turned  to  me. 

"I  will  go  to  Spain  with  you  next  week." 

"You  will  go  as  a  grandee  then.  You  have  done  a 
noble  act" 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  231 

He  twisted  his  eyebrows  at  me.  "Rubbish !  When 
I  came  to  in  that  ghastly  room  I  determined  to  get  at 
that  girl  if  I  broke  down  every  door  in  the  place." 

uSo  you  said." 

"And  I  meant  it.  But  it  was  not  to  carry  her  off. 
It  was  to  tell  her  what  I  thought  of  her.  I  would  have 
told  Chilton,  told  him  to  tell  her,  told  him  when  he 
came  in  the  room,  if  he  had  not  infuriated  me  at  the 
very  start." 

He  broke  off  and  angrily  continued,  "When  I  keeled 
over,  she  never  turned,  she  never  stopped.  For  all  of 
her  I  might  have  died  there.  Afterward,  when  I  sat  on 
that  confounded  sofa,  I  realised  what  must  have  been 
unconsciously  germinating  in  me  ever  since  that  day 
in  the  Park  when  she  said  she  was  dead." 

Surprisedly  I  looked  at  him.    "What  do  you  mean?" 

"I  mean  that  I  hate  her.  It  was  that  that  I  wanted 
to  say." 

Well,  after  all,  it  was  only  natural.  His  torture 
had  been  excessive.  The  screws  had  been  turned 
too  tight.  Besides,  hatred  is  but  love  reversed. 

Before  I  could  say  so,  up  again  ran  the  Spanish  flag. 

"Yes,"  I  said.  "But  you  will  have  to  loan  me  Peters 
for  an  hour." 

That  hour  never  came. 

XXX 

THE  morrow  was  amazing  as  every  morrow  should 
be,  but,  in  the  instance,  shuttled  with  a  vast  surprise 
which  I,  who  had  promenaded  from  the  unexpected  to 
the  unawaited,  had  entirely  omitted  to  foresee. 

The  surprise,  which  battened  on  me  in  a  lift  and 


232  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

multiplied  itself  elsewhere,  began,  after  the  manner  of 
great  events,  in  a  commonplace  fashion. 

I  was  on  my  way  to  sign  the  picture  contract  at  my 
publishers  when  I  ran  into  Aly.  As  I  had  all  that 
had  occurred  to  tell  her,  I  asked  her  to  come  with  me 
and  go  afterward  to  the  sorcerer's  for  his  brews. 

But  though,  good  sort  that  she  was,  she  consented, 
she  did  not  see  her  dear  Mr.  Delmonico  that  day, 
while  I  beheld  what  is  far  rarer  than  any  sorcerer,  the 
complex  phenomenon  of  dual  personality. 

Meanwhile,  we  had  entered  the  junior  partner's 
office.  At  the  moment,  he  was  elsewhere.  But  Miss 
Judson,  his  secretary,  was  there,  and  there  also  was 
a  lanky  young  man,  the  portrait  on  foot  of  a  greenhorn. 

Then,  as  Aly  and  I  waited,  he  addressed  me,  asking 
whether  Broadway  were  uptown  or  down,  and  I  was 
informing  him  when  the  junior  member  entered  behind 
me  with  a  "Hal" 

To  which  he  added,  "I  see  you  know  Bil  Sayers." 

The  depth  of  the  sanctuary  is  the  place  for  idols. 
Invisible,  secreted  from  vulgar  eyes,  there  they  should 
remain.  The  same  may  be  true  of  authors.  Yet, 
while  I  do  not  recall  that  I  had  evolved  any  particular 
image  of  Bil  Sayers,  I  am  sure  I  never  imagined  he 
would  resemble  a  lout.  I  glanced  at  Aly.  She  also 
seemed  perplexed.  There  goes  her  idol,  too,  I  thought, 
when  another  incident  occurred. 

The  junior  member  was  old  and  stout.  The  senior 
member  was  young  and  slim.  At  that  moment,  his 
hat  on,  a  cigar  in  his  mouth,  in  he  marched.  In  all 
the  vanishing  acts  that  prestidigitateurs  perform,  I 
have  seen  nothing  more  instantaneous  than  the  manner 
in  which  that  cigar  disappeared.  No  dancing  master 


THE  GHOST  GIRL  233 

I  ever  heard  of  could  have  been  quicker  with  his  hat. 

It  was  not  for  me  of  course,  nor  even  for  the  lanky 
genius,  that  these  immediate  feats  of  haute  ecole  were 
performed.  He  was  not  looking  at  either  of  us.  He 
was  looking  at  Aly,  and  a  proper  tribute  to  her  beauty 
it  was. 

But  Miss  Judson  had  come  to  me  with  the  contracts 
and  I  went  forward  to  a  desk  where,  with  the  junior 
member  facing  me,  I  sat  down. 

"Our  London  house  has  particularly  requested  the 
autograph.  It  is  for  the  Queen.  I  will  have  a  Dawn 
in  at  once.  Miss  Judson !" 

It  was  the  senior  member's  voice  and  Ho!  I 
thought,  how  tickled  the  Queen  would  be  if  she  could 
see  the  lovely  lad. 

Then  Aly's  voice  reached  me,  though  occupied  as  I 
at  once  became  with  a  tortuous  clause  of  the  contract, 
what  she  said  I  did  not  hear,  and  subconsciously  I 
fancied  she  must  be  expressing — yet  how  far  more 
graciously ! — precisely  what  I  thought. 

Then  I  signed  and  the  old  junior  member  told  me 
the  cheque  would  be  mailed  that  night. 

The  entire  transaction  had  not  taken  more  than  a 
moment  or  so,  but  when  I  got  up  the  young  senior 
member  had  disappeared,  as  his  cigar  had,  gone,  I 
took  it,  for  the  book.  In  the  window  the  genius  stood 
on  one  foot,  picking  his  teeth.  I  thought  the  attitude 
excessive  and  Aly  must  have  thought  so  also.  She 
was  pink. 

Nodding  at  the  junior  member,  I  passed  out  with 
her  to  the  hall  where,  while  waiting  for  the  lift,  I 
condoled. 

"Sorry  I  saw  him,  aren't  you?" 


234  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

At  that  moment  Miss  Judson  flew  up. 

"Shall  I  mail  it  to  you,  mem?" 

Of  all  the  gentle  people  I  ever  met,  Aly  Bolton  is, 
I  think,  the  gentlest.  Yet  instantly,  for  some  undi- 
vinable  reason,  she  assumed  the  expression  of  a  tigress. 

But  a  descending  cage  has  stopped  and  into  it  we  got, 
while  Miss  Judson  called: 

"It's  for  the  Queen,  mem,  did  they  tell  you?" 

The  steel  door  slammed.    Down  we  sank. 

"What  the  dickens  do  you  care?"  I  muttered  at 
her.  Pink  before,  she  was  pinker  then. 

Nor  could  she  have  heard  me,  for  as  we  reached 
the  street  she  said  and  said  it,  too,  with  flashing  eyes : 

"It  is  outrageous.  They  promised  no  one  should 
know." 

Imbecile  that  I  was,  not  until  that  moment  had  it 
dawned  upon  me.  But  in  that  moment,  dawn  came, 
dawn  went.  It  was  day.  With  its  full  light  in  my 
eyes,  I  blinked.  Then  I  laughed. 

"You're  a  sneaky  little  thing." 

A  vagabond  cab  was  passing  and  I  raised  my  stick. 

But  no.  She  did  not  want  to  drive.  She  did  not 
want  elixirs.  As  for  the  old  junior  member  and  the 
young  senior,  never  would  she  put  her  foot  in  their 
shop  again,  while,  as  for  the  Queen,  well,  I  was  glad 
Broadway  was  not  Pall  Mall. 

Never  had  I  seen  her  angry  before.  Never  have  I 
seen  her  angry  since.  Vexed,  yes;  annoyed  also,  but 
angry,  no,  and  I  have  regretted  it.  An  exquisite  girl 
in  a  tempest — what  more  appetising  sight  would  you 
have? 

"And  I  am  not  a  sneaky  little  thing,"  she  snapped  at 
me.  "And  it  is  none  of  your  business  anyway." 


.      THE  GHOST  GIRL  235 

I  have  found  it  politic  to  agree  with  anyone,  no 
matter  whom,  about  anything,  no  matter  what,  and  I 
applied  that  myrrh  and  cassia. 

"Of  course  it  is  none  of  my  business.  Moreover, 
decent  people  never  hear  anything  that  was  not  in 
tended  for  them.  It  was  sneaky  of  me  to  listen.  But 
never  mind.  Your  shameful  secret  is  safe.  No  one 
shall  know  from  me  that  you  are  the  great  Bil  Sayers. 
I  won't  have  the  chance  to  tell.  I  am  leaving  this 
part  of  the  planet." 

She  cocked  the  seashell  of  an  ear.    "What?" 

In  the  tumult  of  the  jostling  street,  it  was  not  pos 
sible  to  go  into  it  then,  nor  did  I  attempt  to  until  we 
reached  her  flat  where  her  "Oh!  Oh's!"  at  my  account 
of  all  that  had  happened  continued  until  the  account 
was  ended  when,  clapping  her  hands,  she  cried: 

"Those  two  will  be  happy  ever  after." 

That,  I  think,  set  the  tune. 

What  I  said,  what  she  said,  what  afterward  occurred 
when  the  brave,  foolish  words,  Forever,  Never,  were 
uttered  by  us  both,  all  that  has  nothing  to  do  with  the 
present  document  except,  that  in  enabling  me  to  build 
an  immediate  castle  in  Spain,  it  withheld  me  from  the 
Alhambra. 

The  fairy  castle  metamorphosed  itself  into  a 
Riverside  flat. 

But  that  also  is  irrelevant.  What  alone  imports  is 
Bradish,  who  accepted  my  infection  with  such  passivity 
that  I  could  not  but  see  he  thought  it  better  so  and  pre 
ferred  to  be  alone. 

That  is  years  ago.  For  a  while  he  wrote.  He  wrote 
from  Avignon.  He  wrote  from  Vallombrosa.  Then 
his  letters  ceased.  During  the  war  he  fought  for  Italy 


236  THE  GHOST  GIRL 

and  died  for  her  in  the  Alps.  There  he  was  delivered 
from  the  sweep  and  loneliness  of  things.  If  the  great 
renunciation  did  not  bring  him  peace,  he  found  it 
there.  There  at  last  he  was  free  and  forever  from 
those  halls  hung  with  enigmas,  tapestried  with  tears, 
before  which  the  sphinx  in  flight  gallops  like  a  jackal. 


THE    END. 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


RENEWED  BOOKS  ARE  SUBJECT  TO  IMMEDIATE 
RECALL 


SEP  1  9 1966 
:  SEP  i  9 1966 
NOV  2  2  ,g67 


LIBRARY,  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  DAVIS 

Book  Slip-70m-9,'65(F7151s4)458 


N2  416830 

PS2752 

Salt us,  E,E.  G£ 

The  ghost  girl. 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


